


Hajime's Sweet Revenge

by x_sugar_high_x



Category: Super Dangan Ronpa 2, 복수노트 2 | Sweet Revenge 2 (2018)
Genre: Enoshima Junko Being An Asshole, Fluff, Hinata Hajime & Soda Kazuichi Friendship, Hinata Hajime Has a Talent, Hinata Hajime and Kamukura Izuru Are Siblings, Kamukura Izuru Has Feelings, M/M, Mentions of alcohol, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Slow Burn, Swearing, 복수노트 2 | Sweet Revenge 2 (aka Revenge Note 2) AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:40:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 21,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28228545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/x_sugar_high_x/pseuds/x_sugar_high_x
Summary: What would you do if the power of revenge was at your fingertips?Hinata Hajime is a 17-year-old high school student at Hope's Peak High School, who discovers an app called Revenge Note. The app allows him to extract revenge on anyone who's name he types.When two beautiful siblings move in next door and transfer to his school, he gets caught in a love triangle with the strange yet entrancing Komaeda Nagito and the responsible gamer, Nanami Chiaki. Things get even more twisted when the mystery of the mastermind behind these acts of revenge comes into play, especially when his brother's crush on the siblings becomes more than evident.What will Hajime learn about life, love and revenge from the mysterious app?You don’t need to have watched the k-drama to understand this haha.
Relationships: Hinata Hajime & Komaeda Nagito, Hinata Hajime/Komaeda Nagito, Hinata Hajime/Nanami Chiaki (One-Sided), Sonia Nevermind/Tanaka Gundham (Side)
Comments: 13
Kudos: 46





	1. Money, Money, Money

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all!
> 
> I have never finished any fanfiction I have started in the past, and with this one, I hope to change that. The characters may seem a bit OOC, and I apologize for that. I did my best to merge the pre-existing characters together (eg; Ji-Na with Hajime), but it may have ended up with it being a little wonky. 
> 
> This will follow the plot of the original k-drama, with some divergence as the plot progresses. Of course, spoilers for the drama will be located within this fic, so if you had Sweet Revenge 2 on your k-drama watch list, I would watch that before reading this. 
> 
> I hope I did my best to bring something enjoyable! If any grammar errors slipped through proofreading, I apologize in advance. 
> 
> Enjoy!

Hinata ran down the street to catch the bus, managing to get the driver to stop. That day he’d been a bit late, but he caught sight of his mother talking to a woman and her daughter. The daughter seemed to be half paying attention, only half awake. She had light pink hair up to her shoulders and looked as though she would fall asleep at any moment. He untied his shoelace to give him more observation time, before catching the eye of the girl as he assisted an old woman on the bus. He glanced in her direction before going on the bus.

Hajime glanced at the man closest to him, watching the man stand up from his seat with an eye roll. The old woman sat down, thanking Hajime. 

-x-

Chiaki had watched the tall boy’s diary fall out of his bag. She was going to grab it and return it immediately, but her mom handed her a call from her father. 

Once the girl had gotten off the phone, she rushed to pick up the diary. The bus left before she could return it though, so she thought it would be best to figure out who this belonged to. She opened it up to the first page. ‘ _ Hope’s Peak High School - Hinata Hajime _ ’ it said. The girl certainly wasn’t about to try and run to the next bus stop to give this back, so she held onto it. She’d give it back when she had the chance. 

-x-

Back on the bus, a red-headed girl with a camera got off the bus and Hajime saw that she left her bag. He picked it up and threw it to her, only to receive a confused look. The blonde with her hair in pigtails still sitting in the seat got off the bus, glaring at Hajime. 

“That’s my bag pigshit!” She said before hopping off the bus. That was her bag? Well damn, his day was off to a great start already.

The bus arrived at Hope’s Peak High School, and Hajime ran over to his best friend, Souda Kazuichi. His bright pink hair and beanie made it easy to recognize him amongst a crowd. Hajime took the piece of paper Kazuichi was holding, greeting him with a “Good morning!”. He was initially startled, snatching the piece of paper back. 

“I have to do really well on this test, don’t steal my notes!” Said Kazuichi. 

“Did you study all night? Your eye bags are down to your knees.” Hajime teased, chuckling at his joke. 

Kazuichi gasped, his hands moving towards the bottom of his eyes. “Is it that bad?” He asked.

“Yes, it’s quite a sight.” Replied Hajime, who took out his phone. “Look at yourself.” He said teasingly while taking some photos of the two of them. 

The pink-haired boy grabbed Hajime’s phone, looking at the photo. “Delete it now. What is this?” Both boys laughed a bit before Kazuichi continued. “I look so weird.”

“Look at you.” Hajime said, pointing at Kazuichi’s face. He really did look tired. Guess Hajime needed to peer pressure him into getting more sleep or something of the sort.

“I look weird.” Kazuichi repeated. He swiped to see the next photo, seeing an old photo of the two friends. “What’s this? Isn’t this from middle school?”

“Yes.” 

“You kept this? Goodness me.” Kazuichi said, a smile spreading on his face.

“Since when does Souda Kazuichi say words like ‘goodness me’?” Teased Hajime.

“Now!” Said Kazuichi, scrolling through the photos some more. A photo of the two with a giant teddy bear appeared. 

“The teddy bear was yours.” Said Hajime. He scrolled to the next photo, revealing a photo of the two in a bright room. “This is from when we went to karaoke. Remember how bad we were?”

“Remember how weird you looked?” Said the other boy, zooming in on Hajime’s face. 

“Let’s go.” Said Hajime, trying to steer the conversation somewhere else as he walked closer to the school’s entrance. 

”Hey, delete that picture.” Kazuichi said, running after Hajime. 

Once Kazuichi had caught up with Hajime, the two walked towards the school. On their backpacks were matching bear keychains. The one on Hajime’s bag was a blue bear, and the one on Kazuichi’s was a pink bear. 

While in class, Kokichi was giving gifts to other people. He gave a couple to Hajime and Souda, only to splash those who had the gifts with water before snatching the gifts back. He had also gotten one of the nearby classmates to take photos and videos, uploading them on Instagram once his gifts he had taken back were safely on his desk. Irritated, Hajime took his seat behind Kokichi. 

“Okay, it’s done! How perfect.” Said Kokichi, receiving an eye-roll from Chabashira Tenko, a girl he so mercilessly drenched in water. 

“Seriously? Don’t upload photos of me like that you degenerate male! Delete it right now.” She said, getting a ‘nishishi’ in return. 

“Why can’t I? It’s funny how easily you fell for my little prank.” 

Hajime sighed, before responding. “It’s sad how much effort you’re putting in.”

“Wow, the number of likes is going up so fast! See how much people can profit off of pranks?” Said Kokichi, ignoring Hajime as the shorter boy looked at Tenko. Tenko slapped her forehead, turning away from Kokichi. 

-x-

On the other side of the room, Enoshima Junko conversed with Ikusaba Mukuro, her older twin sister, and Shirogane Tsumugi. 

“My stupid mom is threatening to suspend my credit card if I don’t get my grades up. Can you believe it? The way she’s thinking so hopeful.” Said Junko, applying some new lip gloss. 

“Is that a new colour Junko? That’d look so great with the new cosplay I’ve been meaning to do.” Said Tsumugi. 

“Yeah, you can have it if you want.” She handed the lip gloss over to Tsumugi. “I was going to buy a different one anyway.”

“Wow, Junko’s so generous. I wonder who’d buy me makeup if your allowance got cut off.” Tsumugi thought out loud. 

“You’d be buying it yourself. Duh. Or Mukuro would buy it for you, right?” Junko poked her sister with her fake red nails. 

“Sure.” Muttered Mukuro, clearly unwilling. It wasn’t like Junko cared though.

-x-

Hajime looked through his bag for his diary, not finding it. “How strange… Where did my diary go?”

Kazuichi turned around to answer him. “Maybe you left it at home? It’s not that common for you to forget things.” Hajime rolled his eyes at the joke. 

“No, I’m positive I brought it with me. I swear to god, no one better look in it if they find it.” Hajime put his stuff back in his bag, placing it on the hook attached to his desk. 

The teacher, Ms. Yukizome, walked in. Everyone was busy talking amongst themselves, not hearing her tell them to be quiet. As the Class Representative, Kuwata Leon, was about to tell them to be quiet, Ms. Yukizome did it herself. 

“Hello you rotten oranges! I hope you’re all settled in by now.” She practically yelled, gathering everyone back to their seats. They knew how intense Yukizome Chisa could get, and they did not want to mess with her. 

“We will skip attendance today, and move to the video assembly. Make sure to pay attention, or I’ll give you guys more homework!” Ms. Yukizome turned on the TV with a press of her remote, paying attention to the assembly as well.

The principal, Tengan Kazou appeared on the screen. He was an old man, and seemed somewhat laid back, but was still quite annoying and strict.

“Life is… Just like sports. From time to time, I keep hearing people say the process is important. But that’s nonsensical.” He started. “In competition, we must win. No matter what. What must a student do to win? You need to do well in school.” The class laughed a bit, letting Mr. Tengan continue. 

“Students who don’t do well in school will have nothing to say. Even if they have nine mouths to speak, they won’t have anything to say.” He said.

Tenko laughed, at his joke, looking at Kokichi. 

“The degenerate principal has once again come up with another saying.” She said, still laughing.

“Be quiet, you also have nothing to say. Unless it’s about that short magician red hea-” Kokichi started, before being cut off.

“Who’s making a fuss over there? I know I’m rather laid back compared to other principals, but I will not tolerate someone interrupting my speech.” He sighed, continuing his speech. “Well, anyway, the performance assessment will begin soon. From now on, if even a single person gets caught cheating, the whole class will have to take the test. If you get caught cheating, I doubt I will ever forgive you for such an irresponsible act.” The class cast a couple of side glances at each other before Mr. Tengan continued. 

“With all that said, I will conclude today’s assembly.” The TV screen turned off, and the classroom filled with chatter. Words like ‘What was that?’ and ‘That was a complete waste of our time’ ran through the classroom, before Ms. Yukizome quieted the class down. 

“It doesn’t really matter if our class gets the lowest or the highest score, as long as we all tried our best. I just don’t want any of you to cheat. Not only will you have to retake the test, but you might get points deducted. And a bad grade on a test doesn’t look so great, does it? I trust you guys to be responsible.” And with that little speech from Ms. Yukizome, class was dismissed. 

-x-

Junko, Tsumugi, and Mukuro ran over to the snack store before their next class. Tsumugi looked around for anything nice, and Mukuro did as well, even though she knew that she was probably going to be paying for all this. 

As the three walked up to the cash register, Junko gave her credit card to the cashier. “I’d like to pay for these.” She said, watching the cashier take her credit card. The cashier swiped it across the machine, getting a couple of beeps in return after a couple of swipes. 

“Your card has been suspended.” She said, handing it back.

“No, it’s not. Try it again.” Junko insisted, practically pushing the card back into the other woman’s hands. The cashier then swiped the card again, with the same result.

“It’s been suspended. Can you move aside for the next customer?” Said the woman, handing the card back.

Junko however, didn’t move. “How despairing, surely my mother can’t be this hopeful in my intelligence!” Said Junko, calling her mother.

“Mother, why did you suspend my card? It’s absolute nonsense to believe in such a hope that my grades will improve!” A moment of silence passed, as well as a glance between Mukuro and Tsumugi before Junko continued talking. 

“Seriously, why do you suddenly keep thinking about my grades? It’s so ridiculous.” Junko said, hearing her mother hang up. 

“Mom? Mom!” Junko exclaimed, still holding her place in line.

“God, who will pay for these now?” Tsumugi thought out-loud.

“You can go get the disgusting one next to you to pay for it or pay for it yourself. Geez, don’t rely on me so much.” Said Junko, flicking her strawberry blonde hair as she walked away. 

“This is so… So hopeful!” She said, before seeing the solution in front of her. In the form of Souda Kazuichi. She hooked her arm around his shoulder before he could walk away.

“Hey, Kazuichi, can I see you for a minute?” She asked nicely, Mukuro and Tsumugi not too far behind. Kazuichi responded with a glance to the side and silence, before being dragged off. 

They were at the back of the school, where Junko was discussing her idea with Kazuichi. 

“So, you can do that for me, right?” She asked. 

“But, if we get caught cheating, our entire class will have to retake the test! C-c’mon, cut me some slack here..!” Exclaimed Kazuichi. 

“We don’t have to get caught. Don’t worry about it, okay?” Said Junko. 

Kazuichi fiddled with something in his pockets, avoiding eye contact. Maybe if he pretended to not be here, he wouldn’t have to help her?

“Just make a few pages of notes as you study, and give them to me! How hard is that? You’re a machine geek, so writing can’t be that hard.” Insisted Junko. 

“I-I’m sorry, but I seriously can’t help you. Studying is your problem-“

Junko stepped closer to him, face mere centimetres apart from his.

“Look nerd, I’m not asking. I may be talking all nice and whatever, but that’s all bullshit. You should know that, right? I can always go back to making you feel copious amounts of despair. So you’re going to help me. Got that?” Said Junko, pushing his forehead against the wall with his finger. Her long red nails left his skin bleeding as she sashayed away. 

-x-

After school, Hajime and Kazuichi went to go eat some tteokbokki. Kazuichi had claimed his injury on his forehead was from a machine gone haywire, but Hajime was skeptical. 

Hajime continued eating, looking at Kazuichi. “This is pretty good. But why aren’t you eating anything? Don’t tell me you’re trying to go on a diet. That’s pretty unnecessary.” 

Kazuichi’s phone buzzed as Junko texted him over and over. Texts with words like ‘answer me’ and ‘are you ignoring me?” constantly appeared on his screen, and Hajime noticed. Kazuichi stuffed his phone in his pocket, muting it. Less noticeable buzzes still came from his pocket as he stood up.

“I’m just not hungry today. Stressed, y’know? I’m not a great student after all…” He muttered the last part, picking up his backpack as he walked away. 

The next morning, Hajime got ready for school a bit later than usual. He had woken up late and now needed to rush to catch the bus. As he was walking out of his room, he saw his younger brother, Kamukura Izuru, with some of his books.

“Which one would you recommend for reading?” He asked his mother, Nevermind Sonia. In his hand, he held a small stack of Hajime’s books, which Hajime certainly did not remember allowing to be touched by Izuru.

“All of them are great, but please put your brother’s stuff away.” Sonia said kindly, ushering Izuru to Hajime’s room.

Hajime ran to the door, only to have his leg caught by his aunt, Mioda Ibuki.

“Water… Hajime-Chan, you have water, right?” Hajime always found it weird how his aunt called everyone something-Chan, but he never commented on it out loud. 

“No…. Hey Izuru, get Aunt Ibuki some water!” Said Hajime, trying to shake his aunt off his leg.

“I’m busy trying to put your stuff away. Go do it yourself.” Izuru said. Hajime knew she was reading some of his books, so he just grabbed Ibuki some water himself. As he was about to give it to Ibuki, Sonia snatched it and drank it herself.

“Auntie Ibuki can get some water herself, correct?” Sonia gave a quick glare at Ibuki before looking back at Hajime. Ibuki sighed, letting go of Hajime’s leg.

“Good luck on your test by the way. Do your best.” Said Sonia before Hajime bolted out of the apartment. 

A man in a pine green sweater walked to his bike on the sidewalk, dropping a coin. His hood was over his head, and his sweater was zipped up, despite it being rather warm weather. As the other man sat on his bike, ready to bike away, Hinata picked up the coin and looked at the man.

“Hey, you dropped this coin.” He said. The man took off his hood, revealing cloud-white hair, sickly pale skin, and green-gray eyes. He had a couple of piercings in both his ears, and one of his earbuds was dangling off one of his ears. His eyes met Hajime’s as he responded.

“You can keep it.” The mysterious man said. His voice was raspy, but soothing at the same time. He couldn’t have been older than Hajime was.

“10 cents is still money.” Hajime shoved the coin in the other teen’s hand, closing his hand for him. “I’m late.” Hajime added, running to the bus stop. 

The white-haired teen flipped the coin in his hand, pocketing it as he biked away. 

Class 77-B of Hope’s Peak High School reviewed their notes last minute before the test. Some were actually studying, others just fooling around and conversing with their peers. Kokichi took a couple of photos of himself writing, uploading them to Instagram with the caption: “anyone wanna help me “study”?” The words he were writing were “gottem” however, frustrating Tenko when she looked at his post.

“Don’t you have any idea how old that joke is? And plus, some of us are actually trying to learn, degenerate male!” Tenko ripped off a sheet of paper from her textbook, throwing it at Kokichi. 

“Wrong page, the info on the test is on the next page, degenerate female.” Kokichi teased, receiving a glare from Tenko. 

Next to Kokichi was Kazuichi, breathing heavily as he fidgeted with his pencil. His textbook and notebook were out in front of him, but he was staring into blank space instead. Hajime spotted Kazuichi with a bottle of Gatorade in hand, walking out of the room. And so, naturally, like the nosy guy he was, he decided to follow. 

Down the hallway, if you took a left, you would reach the female washroom. Kazuichi would normally have no reason to stop by it, but today was different. Enoshima Junko stood in front of the door, clearly waiting for him. Hajime wasn’t too far down the hallway, close enough to hear what was going on. His footsteps quieted as he walked silently closer.

Kazuichi walked up to Junko, handing her the bottle. On the bottle were questions predicted to be on the test, along with some study notes. 

“Oh, you’re a genius. So, these are  _ all _ the questions predicted to be on the test, right? Well, doesn’t matter. If they aren’t, I know  _ exactly _ who set me up.” She giggled evilly, before continuing. “Don’t forget to send me the answers later.” 

Kazuichi nodded, responding with a very quiet “okay”. 

Junko glanced at the bottle again, watching as it was snatched out of her hands. Hajime held the bottle now, looking at it more carefully. He was thankful that he had followed Kazuichi, as now he knew exactly what Junko was planning to do. 

“Are you crazy? No wonder you’ve been acting weird since yesterday.” Hajime said, clearly directed at Kazuichi. 

“Hey, stay out of this.” Junko said, trying to take back the Gatorade. 

“You made him do this, right? Why the hell are you bothering Kazuichi again, Junko?” Hajime shot back, his grip on the bottle only strengthening. 

“Stop butting in!” Junko kept trying to pull the bottle towards her, only to have Kazuichi interfere. 

“Hajime, I told Junko I’d do it for her, okay? Just… Pretend you don’t know.” Kazuichi insisted, only to have Hajime hold the bottle in the end.

“Are you kidding me?” Junko exclaimed.

“You can’t do this. Not to anyone. If you get caught, you’ll have Kazuichi to blame. Isn’t that right, Enoshima Junko?” Hajime grabbed Kazuichi’s wrist tightly. “We’re going back to the classroom.” He said sternly, dragging Kazuichi away. A sentence along the lines of “You can’t do this, Hajime.” was said while being dragged away. 

Junko stood alone in front of the bathroom, groaning in frustration. 

“Hinata Hajime, you crazy little bitch.” 

Back in the classroom, Hajime shoved the bottle in his backpack. He didn’t bother to zip it up and left part of the bottle showing. Of course, since they were in a test, no one would walk around. He took a sigh of relief as he looked to Kazuichi, who was looking down at his desk. 

Moments later, Junko came back into the classroom with a huff. She looked as though she was about to yell at Hajime, but Mr. Munakata arrived. The classroom quieted down, and Junko went back to her seat. 

Mr. Munakata tapped a wooden stick loudly on the podium, placing down the test papers in his hands. 

“Clear your desks, and put everything in your bags.” He said sharply, observing the students. “Hurry up, we don’t have all day.” His stare flew around the room as Hajime picked up his textbooks and shoved them into his backpack, careful not to knock the Gatorade bottle out. 

“First and second row, switch seats.” Said Mr. Munakata, tapping his stick against the podium once again. “You, you, you and you, switch.” The people he pointed to picked up their pencil cases as they proceeded to switch seats, Kazuichi being stopped by Junko, who sat right behind him. Another teacher peered his head into the room, handing Mr. Munakata a clock. They exchanged a couple of whispers before the other teacher left, and Mr. Munakata placed the clock on the chalkboard. 

Kazuichi glanced at Hajime, with Hajime avoiding looking at him. He was nervous, sure, but Hajime knew that Junko was going to try and pull  _ something _ during the test. After all, she had said so herself. Good thing Hajime had a clear view of Kazuichi’s desk. 

Mr. Munakata had poster-like pieces of paper in his hand, which rolled inward slightly at the edges. He paced around as he started to speak.

“For those of you who are thinking, preparing, and deciding to cheat, just wait and see what I’ll do when you get caught.” He handed out the papers to the people in front. “If you’re curious, go ahead and do it.” He looked to the people now sitting in the front row. “Pass the papers down.” 

The sound of crinkling paper was heard, and pencils already scratching answers onto the test. Mr. Munakata set up a timer on the clock, placing it back on the ledge of the chalkboard. The words “60 minutes remaining” were written in big letters.

Mr. Munakata hadn’t stopped his pacing, tapping his wooden stick on his arm occasionally. Crinkling was still being heard, and writing too, with Hajime keeping a close eye on Kazuichi. 

Junko poked Kazuichi from behind, getting the attention of Hajime. How no one else noticed was a surprise and a blessing or a curse in disguise. Kazuichi’s breathing and heart rate visibly quicked, his eyes darting down to his paper. A shaking hand fiddled with his mechanical pencil, still very much noticeable. 

“40 minutes remaining” was now written on the board, the ticking sound of a clock the only sound in the room besides the writing sounds. Mr. Munakata still paced around the room, tapping his stick against his arm quickly. Junko poked Kazuichi harder this time, making him flinch. Hajime caught this once again, watching as Kazuichi put a sheet of answers (from where he got those answers was a surprise to even Hajime, as it seemed as though his paper was mostly empty) in between two halves of an eraser. Mr. Munakata was observing the students work one by one, glancing at their answers from less than a metre away. 

Hajime focused his attention back on Kazuichi, seeing as the eraser was placed inside his desk. Kazuichi then continued to work as Junko put her hand up mere seconds later.

“Teacher,” Junko started, getting the attention of Mr. Munakata. “may I borrow an eraser from the person in front of me?” He nodded in response, Hajime quickly stepping in.

“I’ll, uh, let her borrow one of mine instead.” Said Hajime, handing over his eraser to Junko. “H-here, use this.” Junko glared at Hajime, snatching the eraser from him. 

“10 minutes remaining” was now written on the board, with Mr. Munakata now making a verbal warning about it. “10 minutes remaining.” He said, tapping his stick on the podium to the rhythm of the ticking from the clock. He stopped after a couple seconds though, the tapping still ringing through Hajime’s head. He was near complete, with only a single question left to finish. 

But that didn’t stop Hajime from witnessing an even harsher poke into Kazuichi’s back, an annoyed look plastered all over Junko’s face. A shaky breath was released from Kazuichi as he quite obviously put the list of answers in the cap of a pen. He slipped the pen inside his desk, next to the cut-up eraser. 

Once again, Junko raised her hand seconds after Kazuichi had placed the pen in his desk. 

“Teacher, my pen is out of ink.” She said, a suspicious look on Mr. Munakata’s face. “I’m going to borrow one from the person in front of me.” Hajime quickly raised his hand, cutting in before Mr. Munakata could say anything.

“I will, uh, let her borrow one of mine.” Said Hajime, handing over a spare pen to Junko as her frustrated expression met his calm one. Kazuichi merely looked away while mouthing what appeared to be sorry as Junko took the pen from Hajime. Hajime resumed working quickly, as he still needed to finish his test. 

Mr. Munakata walked over to Junko’s desk, glancing at Hajime for a moment. He tapped his stick against her desk, pushing her paper to the side a bit. He was practically hovering as he watched her work. He brought his stick up back to his side, glancing at Hajime and his paper once again. The timer went off, sounding a jingle in the room. For some odd reason, everyone found it necessary to look up. 

“Put down your pens and hand in your tests.” Said Mr. Munakata, exasperated and tired sighs filling the classroom. “Hurry up.”

Junko looked at Hajime with a glare, Hajime joining the sea of sighs.

“It’s over. It’s finally over.” He said, putting away his pens and erasers. He leaned back into his chair as Junko stood up from her desk. 

Walking towards Hajime’s desk, she kicked his backpack, causing the Gatorade bottle to fall out. “Hey, are you crazy?” Asked Junko, before she swiftly returned to her seat.

The eyes of Hajime, Junko, and Kazuichi followed the bottle as it hit Mr. Munakata’s foot. Well, it was about to, but he stopped it with his foot before it could. Mr. Munakata picked up the bottle, examining it. 

“What is this…?” He asked quietly, eyes falling on Hajime. He felt his heart stop as he thought about the situation from the teacher’s current perspective. A bottle full of cheats was in his hands, which had just rolled out from a student’s backpack. Yep, Hajime definitely looked guilty. 

Mr. Munakata took long, agonizing steps towards Hajime, bottle still in hand. His angry expression certainly did not help the anxiety welling up inside Hajime right now. All eyes fell on Hajime, well, except for Kazuichi’s. He did spare a quick glance for Hajime but then looked back at his desk.

“What is this?” Asked Mr. Munakata, waving the bottle in Hajime’s face. Junko looked down at her desk, a mischievous smile easily hidden since no one was paying any attention to her. She looked back up at Hajime, her expression back to neutral. It was terrifying and amazing how great of a liar Junko was, at least, it was to Hajime. Did that make her any less annoying and rude? Nope.

“Hinata Hajime, answer me right this instant.” Said Mr. Munakata, Hajime looked down at his desk, as if that would give him any words. Anything he said would throw Kazuichi under the bus, and he didn’t want that. But he couldn’t lie and say that it was all Junko because she wasn’t the one who made it. So he settled for something a bit vaguer.

“It’s not mine, Mr. Munakata.” Replied Hajime. Short and simple, good enough. Junko and Kazuichi both looked at Hajime, expecting him to say something else.

“It fell out of your bag, Hinata Hajime. If it’s not yours, do tell, who’s is it?” Asked Mr. Munakata, pushing the bottle closer to Hajime’s face. He turned away from Hajime, looking at the class now. 

“How dare you cheat in front of me?” He asked, clearly directed at Hajime. Most of the class still had their eyes fixed on Hajime, with others giving each other nervous glances. They all knew what cheating and getting caught meant.

“You made it so well too.” Mr. Munakata said, looking at the bottle once more. Hajime seemed on the verge of tears, or just very upset. He was both. 

“Have you been… Passing this thing around?” He asked, looking at the entire class. No one responded, leaving the air quiet and heavy. A simple staple could drop, and it’d still be heard. Hajime’s current predicament made him feel like he was in a k-drama, so when would a dreamy love interest or two come swinging along to save him? (Not that he was relying on that, but just thought it’d be funny if something like that did happen.)

“Since you’ve been caught by me,” He paused, supposedly for suspense. “everyone must retake the test.” Loud groans and sighs were heard from Hajime’s other classmates, with some keeping it at groaning, and others cursing Hajime. Words such as ‘Oh my god’ and ‘What?’ flooded the classroom, turning what was once a quiet room into a loud room full of whiny freshmen students. They had a right to be upset of course, because of Junko, this whole thing happened. Except, they all thought Hajime was the one who cheated. 

The room quieted down as Mr. Munakata tapped his stick loudly against the pedestal, telling the class how he couldn’t trust them anymore. Birds were chirping peacefully in the background as Mr. Munakata kept talking, but Hajime only heard something about a retake. Before he knew it, the teacher was out of the room, and so was the class president. 

Groans filled the room once again, even louder than before. “My goodness.” Said one student, followed by “What is this?” from another. “I didn’t study anyway.”, “Gosh.”, “So stupid.” and more were all spilling from Class 1-A, and some sniffing was heard too. During all of this, the only thing Hajime could do was avoid anyone and everyone’s eyes, and pretend he wasn’t there. 

Kazuichi looked as though he was going to get up and say something to Hajime, but Junko pushed him back into his seat, walking up to Hajime instead. 

“You’re amazing. You’ve been pretending to be nice, yet you’ve been cheating all along?” Said Junko, the classroom silencing with her words. The rest of the students were either looking at Hajime or staring at their desks. Hajime glared at Junko, trying not to show his obvious frustration. This was not fair, it was all her bull that led him into this situation in the first place. 

“What are you looking at? You have nothing to say.” Hajime held back a cough. “Even if you had nine mouths, you’d still have nothing to say.” He held back another cough, standing up to face Junko better. Hajime was 10 centimetres taller than Junko, so that gave him somewhat of a feeling of dominance. 

“Enoshima Junko, you know that’s not true.” Hissed Hajime.

“What’s not true?” She quickly retaliated. “If you didn’t make it, who did?” Of course, Junko knew exactly what to say. Throwing Kazuichi under the bus would be even too harsh for Hajime to do, and admitting it was his fault would just be helping Junko’s attempts at making him feel despair. 

“Who? Who made it Hajime?” Hajime glanced at Kazuichi, who looked away. So Hajime remained silent. 

“Hinata Hajime, you’ve been caught red-handed. Just admit that you cheated. It’s not very Plus Ultra of you to drag on this lie.” Said Tsumugi. Mukuro nodded.

“N-now we’ve all g-got to re-do the test. Don’t you t-think before you c-cheat? I-if you’re going t-to cheat, at l-least d-do it well goddamnit!” Toko muttered, loud enough for everyone to hear. 

“Why d-did you do th-that Hajime? I-if we re-do the t-test, all the q-questions will change! I-if I fail, a-are you going t-to take the b-blame? A-ah! I’m s-s-sorry….” Cried Mikan, who was being comforted by Chihiro and Aoi. 

“D-don’t worry, I can explain. All of this. I’m not the one who-” 

“You’re so shameless. We know you said you haven’t made it, but who else did? You’re not telling us who, so that leaves you. Seriously, who are you trying to blame? How despairing, you truly are a piece of trash, Hinata Hajime.” Said Junko.

Kazuichi moved his hands to his bright pink hair, almost like he was trying to hide. “Why are you crying?” Asked Rantaro, who was now trying to comfort Kazuichi.

Hajime looked to the side, trying to think of what he could do. Hajime remembered seeing something on Kazuichi’s face, possibly tears, before he was out of the classroom. Next thing he knew, he was in the teacher’s office. 

Mr. Munakata was looking at Hajime’s performance assessment sheet, with Hajime standing to the side of him. And he watched as Mr. Munakata ripped up his test papers, with Ms. Yukizome watching from her desk too. 

“Obviously, you’re getting a zero on your test. How dare you cheat in front of me?” A rhetorical question, but Mr. Munakata left a bit of a gap, almost like it was for an answer. And in that gap, Ms. Yukizome intervened. 

“Kyosuke, you should hear his side of the story. Or at least try to.” She said.

In response, Mr. Munakata placed the Gatorade bottle on the top of the bookshelf separating the desks of the two adults. 

“Look at this, Yukizome. What more proof do I need to hear? We’ve got the proof right here.” He pointed to the bottle.

The other teachers, Mr. Naegi and Ms. Kirigiri, walked over to the bottle, inspecting it. The other two teachers exchanged a small look, before looking back at Hajime. 

“My gosh, I don’t want to believe one of our students made this, but if you did, you could’ve spent time studying instead of preparing to cheat.” Said Mr. Naegi.

“That’s…. Certainly a lot of effort put into this creation.” Added Ms. Kirigiri, almost with some kind of skeptical look on her face. 

Hajime was dismissed soon after, walking into the classroom. It was empty, with gym uniforms laying on some chairs. Hajime walked back out of the classroom, towards the cafeteria. 

  
  


Kazuichi noticed Hajime walking into the full cafeteria as others paid no attention to it. Glancing around the room, Hajime made eye contact with Kazuichi for the first time in a while. Hajime walked further into the cafeteria, Junko spotting him and looking at him from a distance. Hajime walked down one of the aisles the tables had created, glancing at Kazuichi from the side. Junko stuck her leg out while he wasn’t looking, causing him to fall forward. She then dumped her tray of food on Hajime’s back, making a clanging noise as it fell. 

“Hey, who do you think you are?” Scoffed Junko, the entire cafeteria now staring at Hajime from their seats. Their stares burned, leaving Hajime speechless. Not in a good way. Tsumugi whispered something to Mukuro, with Mukuro nodding in return.

“You’re really getting on my nerves. Clean it up.” Her head dipped to the side for a moment, motioning to the food on the ground. Hajime rolled his eyes, sighing as Junko made her leave.

Before she left though, Junko looked at Kazuichi. “Souda Kazuichi, you’re not going to follow me?” She asked. Kazuichi looked back at Hajime before following Junko out. And Hajime watched as Junko sashayed out of the room, with Mukuro, Tsumugi, and Kazuichi. 

So there Hajime was, in his gym clothes, attempting to wash the stain out of his main uniform. Sure, he had another uniform, but it was new and wearing it seemed unnecessary. In the end, the stain didn’t wash out, so Hajime would have to fix it when he got home. Hajime sighed. “What a long, stupid day this is.” He muttered, walking out of the bathroom with his dirty uniform.

Hajime returned to the classroom with his uniform in hand, noticing his backpack gone. Taking out his phone, he saw a photo of Kazuichi and himself which was taken days before the start of the school year. He sighed again. “Seriously? At least message me before going…. We’re supposed to be friends, y’know?” Even though no one was around, Hajime hoped his words would somehow get to Kazuichi.

Luckily for Hajime, he had found his backpack in his locker space after a quick search. He was now sitting on the floor at a convenience store, in a dazed like state. But not dazed enough to be passed out, because a few metres away was a conversation about him. 

“Gosh, it’s annoying.” Said a girl from Class 2. “The stickers are all the same.” She was looking through some bread, trying to see which ones were “healthier”. (Spoiler alert, none of them were.) “Wait, did you hear? Someone got caught cheating in Class 1.” She added shortly after.

“Are you serious? That’s so crazy. So Class 1 will retake the test huh? That sucks.” The other girl added.

“We should be thankful the crazy guy wasn’t in our class. God, I wonder what the class did to him after that.” 

“Wow, that is so wild. I would pull out all his hair, if he had enough to be pulled.” They went back and forth on possible things they would do, which Hajime gladly tuned out. After a while, they stopped talking about that and moved onto a somewhat different topic.

“Oh, and, even after getting caught, he refused to admit that he did it.” 

“Really? That really is crazy huh? He could’ve at least taken responsibility for what he did instead of insisting it was someone else. What a loser.” 

“Yeah, I know right. Why would you even do a thing? He is so shameless.” 

Hajime fiddled with his tie, listening to their conversation. Sure, it was hard to listen to, but that is probably how the entire thing looked like to an outsider. If everyone knew what Hajime knew, they’d either be harassing Kazuichi or Junko. Most likely Junko. But it’s not like he was going to walk up to the girls in the other class and tell them that it was all Junko and that they should be gossiping about her and not him. 

“If you are not going to make a purchase, I would advise you to pause your meddling with the product and be on your way.” Said the cashier. The girls then put down the bread and walked out of the store with an eye-roll. 

Hajime was still fidgeting with his tie by the time the store clerk came around to talk to him. 

“I was informed the collection of students in the freshman year had an assessment.” Hajime looked up at the clerk, also by the name of Tanaka Gundham. He didn’t respond, just looked.

“Did you achieve a below-par total?” He asked.

“What? Uh, um, yeah. I did actually.” Hajime dryly laughed, dropping his tie and pulling his backpack further up his left arm. 

“Don’t fret, singularity. These types of issues may arise at times.” Gundham handed over some bread. “Accept these as encouragement so things will go successfully in the future. Cheer up.” At least the last part was somewhat easy to understand - Gundham had a weird way with words, but it certainly was nice for a change. Hajime’s lips turned into a small smile as he looked at Gundham with a nod. 

And so, Hajime walked home in his gym uniform, feeling slightly in higher spirits thanks to Gundham. Except, it seems as though his mind did not want him to feel this way, as he remembered what exactly had happened today. 

_ “Everyone must retake the test.” _

_ “I-if we re-do the t-test, all the q-questions will change! I-if I fail, a-are you going t-to take the b-blame?” _

_ “You’re so shameless. _

_ “Just admit that you cheated.” _

_ “Seriously, who are you trying to blame? How despairing, you truly are a piece of trash, Hinata Hajime.” _

_ “We should be thankful the crazy guy wasn’t in our class.” _

_ “Wow, that is so wild.” _

All the voices of his classmates and even those in the other class flooded his head, making it slightly hard to think. Proving to everyone that he was in the clear was going to be very hard, especially without any concrete evidence. And everything he would do could lead back to Kazuichi. His walking pace slowed down slightly, the floor becoming the most interesting thing on the sidewalk. Leaves were kicked around as his feet dragged on the ground. 

Hajime hadn’t stopped dragging his feet on the ground when he arrived at his apartment’s building, walking past pillars to arrive at the “front door” of sorts. He absentmindedly stared into the keypad, sighing. He was almost home, just a few more steps and a sprinkle of effort, then he could jump into his bed and pretend he didn’t exist. 

A few footsteps were heard behind him, Hajime not bothering to look behind. Then something, or presumably, someone bumped into him. They were playing on a GameGirl, and upon closer inspection, it seemed to be the same girl he had seen previously when boarding the bus. She looked up from her game, meeting eyes with Hajime. 

“Who are you?” Hajime asked bluntly, with the girl looking back at her game. It took a couple of seconds before she responded.

“My family moved into the fourth floor today.” She responded, a tired expression seeping into her words. 

“That doesn’t answer my question of who you are.” Responded Hajime. The girl seemed to really be absorbed into her game if she wasn’t making eye contact.

And with that, she looked up from her game console, meeting eyes with Hajime once again. “Nanami Chiaki. Nice to meet you….” Her eyes wandered to the nametag on my uniform. “Hinata Hajime.” The memory of the fallen diary belonging to a Hinata Hajime flew in and out of her mind, reminding her that she needed to return it at some point. 

“Nice to meet you too.” Said Hajime. A moment of awkward silence passed by, and Hajime seemed a little skeptical of Chiaki moving into the apartment. Seconds after the thought crossed his mind, the pink-haired gamer typed in the code to the door, with the door emitting a classic “The door has been unlocked.”. Guess that answered that doubt. 

Chiaki looked back at Hajime before he walked into the apartment. She stood still for a moment, before following suit, eyes glued back onto her game console’s screen.

-x-

Upon arriving home, Chiaki flipped through the pink cat backpack she had left at home for the one outing she went on. As she looked through her textbooks and notebooks, she couldn’t seem to find Hajime’s diary. Maybe she had dropped it somewhere? It was bound to be somewhere in her house, that was for sure. Where it was however, a complete mystery. 

Slightly frustrated, she let out a sigh. “I’ll find it at some point…..” She said that well aware that she would most likely forget at some point, but there wasn’t too much she could do about that. She’d find it and return it, sooner or later. 

-x-

Hajime stared at his phone from his desk, looking at the text he had just sent. The events of the day wouldn’t leave his mind, no matter how much he tried to sketch or paint to take his mind off it all. 

‘ _ Kazuichi, did you get home safe?’ _ is what the text said. Nice and friendly, that should count for something, right? Moments later, he saw the message turn from delivered to read. Yet, no response came. Hajime bit his lip, trying to think up ideas of why his best friend could possibly leave him on  _ read. _

Maybe Kazuichi was just tired, and checked his texts before he went to bed early? Or maybe he opened the text by accident, but that would mean that he didn’t want to read the text. Was this something Junko had told him not to do? Answer his texts? That wouldn’t make any sense, and it’s not like Kazuichi would’ve given away his phone. At least, not out of free will. And if it got that far, Kazuichi would’ve surely gotten someone else involved, like his parents. This whole situation was entirely and utterly-

“Your thoughts are too loud.” Said Izuru, who was standing at Hajime’s bookshelf. Ah, it seemed as though Hajime was too absorbed in his own thoughts to even acknowledge his own brother. Although, Izuru was quite light on his feet, and sneaky too. 

“Sorry, I’m going up to the roof for some air.” Said Hajime, quickly running away after shoving his phone in the pocket of his hoodie. Izuru shrugged his shoulders, taking some books out and putting the ones he had finished back. 

“What’s up with him today?” Pondered Izuru, returning back to his room moments after the brief interaction, indeed seeing no sign of Hajime in their apartment at the current point in time. 

The rooftop of the apartment complex was nicely lit up by fairy lights, and some lights by the railing. There were even some artificial grass and potted plants on the side, as well as an area to hang and dry clothes. A large square bench sat in the middle of the fake grass plot, with the other bench and table being on a bit more of a secluded area of the roof. That specific area wasn’t covered by grass, and wood instead for flooring. Some more potted plants were pressed up against the railing. Light pollution was certainly not uncommon around the area Hajime lived in, but that wasn’t exactly his problem. 

What was his problem however, was the voices of his classmates and teachers overlapping in his head. 

_ “I trust you guys to be responsible.” _

That one might just have been worse than whatever the hell Junko was saying. Ms. Yukizome trusted our class, trusted him, and Junko went and fucked everything up. He kicked the square bench, a slight shake rumbling from the bench before it settled down. And now, the slight pain in his foot was his problem too. Great. 

Hajime pulled his phone out of his pocket, checking for any kind of response from Kazuichi. And still, nothing. 

“Why are you being like this too?” Hajime felt the urge to hit the bench rise again, but he stopped himself, sighing heavily instead. 

His arms dropped to his side as he sat down on the bench, suddenly glad he didn’t kick it another time. With all the bad luck he had been experiencing lately, it might’ve just collapsed under him. 

And so, Hajime paced around on the roof, looking out at the sky occasionally or at the other buildings surrounding the apartment complex. He never decided to go by the secluded bench area, as although he did need some privacy, there was some laundry hanging on the string where the grass ended and wood started. If anyone was there, they probably would’ve asked him what he was doing, or had their headphones too loud and couldn’t hear. 

He wasn’t staring out into the abyss of the starry sky when he heard his phone ping from a text message.  _ Finally, he decided to answer me. _

That thought however was very quickly thrown out the window as Hajime looked at who had sent the message. Of course, it had to be Junko. And in the class chat as well. 

**DespairOverHope:** You shouldn’t be two-faced like that, Hajime. 

**the16thstudent:** You’re so selfish, it’s unbelievable. 

**cosplaynerd:** What the heck? I feel bad for your parents. 

**LuminaryOfTheStars:** You obviously did it. How annoying. 

**Chefdaddy( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°):** If we end up redoing the test, it’s all your fault. How do you expect to get the girls now Hajime?

**AnimeIsImportant:** How well did you think you could do? You’re not even smart.

**Lolita_Gambler:** Stop being nosy, it’s disgusting.

**writingprodigy:** You’re acting like you’re the victim. 

**\--mechboy has left the chat.--**

Great, even shy Ryota was harassing him about the situation, and Kazuichi left the group chat. So he was leaving Hajime on read on purpose. How bad was this going to get? His parents would eventually find out. Maybe his mom would be forgiving about it? Who was he kidding, cheating on a test was looked down upon by everyone, parents included. 

But the cheating part wasn’t even the worst of it at this point. Maybe it was the fact that Kazuichi was ignoring Hajime, or that he was the scum of the earth to his entire grade. Maybe it was bottled up emotion from all the bullshit he had to deal with. He stood up, walking around a little, before sitting back down. Perhaps curling up into a ball and crying was a good idea. Well, his brain clearly thought so, as hot tears started dripping down his face. 

One part of his brain was screaming at him to stop being a baby and to stop crying, but the other part of his brain said “Fuck that.”. So he cried, hiding his face behind his hands, hiding his hands with his knees as soon as he brought them up to his chest. He was even sitting and crying like a baby, great. 

A star in the sky glistened a little too brightly as this happened, returning to its normal state moments later. It had barely caught Hajime’s attention, but he had noticed it for sure. 

Hajime looked at his phone background, which was him and Kazuichi days before they were about to start their first day of high school at Hope’s Peak. A sniffle escaped his lips as a pop-up appeared on his screen. 

**Would you like to download Revenge Note?**

An ominous pop-up indeed, one that seemed likely to give his phone a virus. He had purchased it quite recently, so he wouldn’t want to do that to his phone so quickly, but his fingers moved faster than his brain, and the download button was pressed. 

“Revenge Note, huh?” He muttered, slipping his phone into his pocket and placing his hand down on someone else’s. 

Wait, someone else’s hand?


	2. Operation: Misery (Let it commence!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for not updating! This is (about) half of how long I was intending to make the original chapter, but I cut it in half so I'd have something to update with. This is constantly being written on the side, and I promise that this will be finished at some point in time. Hopefully I'll get more free-time so I can write more for you readers. My apologies for any spelling or grammatical mistakes that made it through proof-reading. 
> 
> Enjoy!

Nagito walked onto the rooftop, taking in the sight. Not that there was too much to be seen. Benches, potted plants, fairy lights, all of which were things you could find on a rooftop of another apartment building. 

He walked towards the railing, placing his arms on the railing and letting his hands dangle off. The view of the other apartments and houses was nice for the most part, but a dark night sky with light only coming from the moon and stars would be a pleasant view as well. But Nagito certainly couldn’t change any of that, and he wasn’t planning to. 

Nagito took in the surroundings, sighing when he heard his phone chime. He could take a wild guess at who was texting him at this hour. After all, it was 9 PM. 

Taking his phone out of his pocket, he looked at the message sender. Of course, his mom. 

**Mom:** Have you had dinner yet?

As if. 

**Mom:** How is your new school?

Haven’t attended.

**Mom:** I can trust you, right?

Wouldn’t recommend it. 

**Mom:** Call me when you get this. 

Most certainly not. 

Of course, telling his mom all this would result in some kind of reprimanding, so he left all his responses in his head. He also never opened the texts, so his mom would never be left on read. 

Nagito pulled the headphones around his neck onto his ears, walking to the wood-covered area of the rooftop, and taking a seat on the bench. He debated between bringing a book or his headphones, but settled for headphones instead, as a book had more potential to be ruined in the outdoors. 

Leaning back on the bench, he pulled his hood up from underneath his back, continuing to observe the neighbourhood from the comfort of the bench. 

Nagito had his headphone volume relatively low, mainly so it wouldn’t be blasting his ears, but a sigh was heard through his music. Did he sigh? He didn’t remember it. Nagito brushed it off as some trick of the mind, going back to relaxing. Or at least, attempting to. 

More words were being heard through his music, and it certainly wasn’t him. It was a male’s voice, coming from the fake grass side of the rooftop. Soon after, crying was heard. 

Nagito wasn’t the nosy type, but the person on the other side of the roof definitely sounded upset. So Nagito took his headphones off, letting them rest on his neck, and walked over to the other guy.

He recognized the male as the one who gave back the coin he had dropped, which was resting in the pocket of his jacket. Nagito had time to take in the appearance of the boy, well, to the best of his abilities, since this boy was currently crying.

His hair was light brown and spiky, a piece of hair sticking up from his head. He had a tanned complexion, and looked to be around Nagito’s height. He wasn’t as thin as Nagito was, and probably had a lot more muscle than he did. But it took a bit longer than he’d like to admit for Nagito to realize that he was a bit… Close. 

Nagito scooted to the right a bit, keeping his hand planted in between himself and the other boy. It was a shame he didn’t read the nametag on the boy’s uniform when he was biking around, because then he didn’t have to think of him as just “boy”. At least he wasn’t crying anymore, and he was on his phone. Amidst his thoughts, he heard him say something about a revenge note, before a hand was placed on his. 

-x-

“Ahh!” Said the person next to him, but he didn’t move his hand. The two stared at each other for a moment before the other person slid his hand out from under Hajime’s hand. 

“I’m sorry, I was near and I saw you upset and I just-” The mystery person, who turned out to be a guy, started rambling with a flush on their face. Hajime recognized this guy as the one who dropped his coin on the street, but that didn’t stop him from cutting him off with his usual blunt tone.

“Who the hell are you?” Hajime yelled, standing up and moving away from the guy. He had white hair, which almost looked like cotton candy, porcelain skin, and a thin frame. 

The man stood up to face Hajime. He seemed just slightly taller than Hajime, which made him just the smallest bit angry. 

“Komaeda Nagito. I moved into the fourth floor today.” His voice was raspy, but it wasn’t annoying to listen to. And hadn’t that Chiaki girl moved into the fourth floor too? 

“Do you know Nanami Chiaki?” Hajime asked, not bothering to give Nagito his name.

“Straight to the point I see. Aren’t you going to introduce yourself first?” So Nagito had some sass too. Two can play at that game. 

“I don’t know if I should. After all, you did sit down next to me and watch me go on my phone. How long were you watching me for anyway?”

“Long enough. Aren’t you going to introduce yourself, or am I just going to have to remember you as ‘Guy who touched my hand randomly after crying and looking at his phone’?” At least Nagito had somewhat of a good point there. He just hoped “long enough” wasn’t too long. Hajime still hadn’t figured out what this Revenge Note even did. 

“... Hinata Hajime. Don’t make me repeat it.” Hajime hissed, almost somewhat angry that Nagito hadn’t done anything for the amount of time he was watching him. Seriously, who sits around and watches someone cry?

“Hinata Hajime. Not a bad name, Hinata-kun. Common, but not so much here.” Hajime rolled his eyes. 

“Way to state the obvious, marshmallow boy.” Hajime’s elbow met with Nagito’s side, hitting him in a teasing way. Well, it would’ve been a teasing way if Nagito didn’t fall over. Hajime bent down slightly, offering his hand to Nagito. It was the least he could do for knocking him over. Nagito was still recovering from the fall when someone else came into the picture. 

“Well, well, well. Hajime, what is this?” Said a familiar voice. Izuru. Hajime took Nagito’s hand a bit forcefully and dragged him up with whatever strength he had before looking at Izuru.

“Nothing’s coming out of this.” Hajime snarled, but that seemed to have no effect on Izuru, as his expression did not change one bit. But his voice changed to be more teasing. 

“Mhm…. Right Hajime. Absolutely nothing. I’ll be on my way. Don’t do anything you might regret with this new boy.” Said Izuru before walking away from Nagito and Hajime.

“Izuru, come back here! Kamukura Izuru! You’re not funny!” Izuru didn’t come back, but Nagito looked at me with a slight sense of confusion. Hajime looked at his face in more detail. His eyes were a pale-ish green-gray, and his eyelashes were thick. White too. At least he looked better than when he fell. 

“Are you alright? I didn’t mean to knock you over.” Said Hajime, but Nagito didn’t seem to respond for a couple of seconds. Was he just weird? 

“I’m…. Fine. Is that other kid, Kamukura Izuru, related to you?” Asked Nagito. Right, that question was one Hajime was well acquainted with. Last names were confusing. 

“..... Yes. What about it?” Hajime responded. 

“No reason, just curious. There’s no need to make such a scary face.” Replied Nagito, holding his hands in front of him. This kid certainly was stranger than Hajime originally thought he was. 

“Cool. I’m going. Bye.” Hajime stated as he walked down the stairs to his family’s apartment. He went to Izuru’s room, intending to have a little chat. 

-x-

Nagito walked down to his apartment seconds after Hajime left the rooftop, catching a glimpse of Hajime walking into his apartment. That made them neighbours. Great. He might’ve attended Hope’s Peak High School, like Nagito was soon to do. 

Walking into his own apartment, Nagito witnessed his sister, Nanami Chiaki, making something on the stove. It was a wonder how she wasn’t asleep at the stove. Chiaki turned her head to face Nagito, who had his arm wrapped around himself, just a little higher than his waist. That was where Hajime had hit him, and although it wasn’t supposed to induce any pain at all, Nagito had still fallen and gotten injured from the impact. Guess this was a prime example of intent versus impact. 

“What happened to you?” She said sleepily, trying to move his arm out of the way so she could inspect the damage. Nagito batted her away with his free hand.

“Nothing. I don’t need your help.” Nagito replied, a hint of anger in his voice. Chiaki stepped away from Nagito, sighing.

“Are you sure everything’s okay? I’m your sister, I can help.” Insisted Chiaki. How many times did she need to be told that Nagito was fine. 

“Why? Do you think I caused trouble?” Nagito said. Chiaki looked as though she was holding back a yawn. So he was boring enough to be tired around. 

“No, that’s not what I meant. And no, you’re not boring. You know I’m just tired…” Chiaki yawned, rubbing her eyes. “And mom called earlier. She wants you to call her back.” He knew of course, he saw the texts.

“She talked to you. That’s enough, isn’t it?” Not waiting for an answer, Nagito walked to his room, leaving Chiaki alone. 

Nagito ruffled his hair with a towel in an attempt to dry it. He sat on his bed, placing the towel around his neck. The room in the apartment was certainly a bit different from the one he lived in when he lived in Japan, but it was similar in the items in it. A bed, desk, photographs and books were all constants whenever he moved. 

Something he wished was a constant was the opportunity to make friends. He certainly was lucky to have dropped a coin while he was biking, and his luck even brought Hinata-kun back to him again. 

_ “10 cents is still money.”  _

To think he would take time out of his day to give Nagito’s coin back, even though he was late to school. And it was a completely different currency than the one used in Korea! But to think that he would become so filled with despair to the point of tears. Did Nagito make him any better? Probably not, even just his presence could’ve made Hinata-kun feel worse. What was all this about a “Revenge note”? Maybe some research would be required. 

Nagito’s thoughts released in the form of a heavy sigh. “What a strange guy he is.” 

-x-

“Revenge note?” Hajime asked aloud, looking at where the app should’ve been on his screen. By now, it should’ve downloaded, but maybe that wasn’t how it worked with this app? After all, it did just randomly appear as a popup on his phone. “Is someone pulling a prank on me?” 

Hajime turned his screen around, expecting something to happen. The app didn’t appear on his screen, the photo of himself and Kazuichi staring him down. “I wonder what this is.” Hajime looked around his room, and put his phone down on his desk. His desk wasn’t really messy, other than having a bunch of different art supplies scattered on the surface which he was too lazy to put back in their regular place. There were a couple books left on his desk with a note, which he picked up to read. 

_ “Here are your books back. Please refrain from yelling at me in the future over my teasing. You are only wasting your own time. - Izuru” _ Is what it read. As if. 

Hajime left the note on the pile of books, walking over to his bed. He needed a long rest. For about, well, forever. Or until Junko decided that she was done being the biggest bitch in the entire universe. 

Throwing the covers over his face, he sighed, closing his eyes. 

Hajime’s phone buzzed as soon as his eyes closed, an app appearing on the screen. 

-x-

A new day, another day of having to deal with Junko. That’s what Hajime’s brain was telling him on his walk to school. The scenery he got to see everyday was easy on the eyes, at least when it wasn’t covered in snow on a sunny day. 

Hajime was looking at the trees and flowers rather intensely when he tripped, scraping the bottom of his palms as he slid on the ground. He did come to a stop moments after the incident, but that didn’t stop himself from feeling embarrassed. He never fell like that, it was normally Mikan who would be slipping and falling to the ground. 

Hajime stood up as quickly as he could, feeling a burning sensation on his hands. Great. They were bleeding. Guess he’d need to deal with that at school, at least, if he ever made it there. People were staring at him as they walked by, which he ignored to the best of his abilities. “Of course my day is going south already.” Hajime muttered, walking away. 

-x-

Behind Hajime stood Chiaki, who had witnessed him fall. She couldn’t tell why Hajime didn’t notice the puddle and the hole in which the puddle was residing, but that wasn’t the biggest of concerns. “He’s certainly an interesting character.” Yawned Chiaki with a smile, walking in the same direction as Hajime. 

-x-

Hajime lined up for the bus, scanning his bus card as he got on the vehicle. Seeing as there were no free seats, he held the handle above him. It wasn’t too high, as Hajime was relatively tall, so he had no trouble holding on. Although how long it would be before his arm turned numb from holding up too long was a question Hajime would rather not have solved. 

The peaceful buzz of multiple conversations at once flooded the air, which Hajime didn’t mind. What he  _ did _ mind was having his (mostly) peaceful mood disturbed. With how badly his day had started, the last thing he wanted was for someone to annoy him on the bus. 

“Hey, look at him.” A girl said, which Hajime recognized as the girl from the day before, who talked about the cheating incident. Guess that meant her friend would be here too. Hajime glanced in their direction.

“That’s who I was talking about.” Ah, of course, Ando Ruruka and Kimura Seiko. Seiko never appeared to be the gossip type, but maybe hanging out with Ruruka changed her view on things. 

“Who?” Said Seiko.

“That guy. You know.” Ruruka said that almost as a whisper, yet loud enough to be heard.

“Ooh. Right, him.” Ruruka shot a glare in Hajime’s direction, followed by a glare from Seiko.

“His classmates are too nice.”

“He’s the Super High School Level Artist right?”

“Yeah, they should’ve thrown out all his sketchbooks or something.”

“Maybe even cut that weird piece of hair at the top of his head.” 

Hajime took a deep breath. If he just pretended the two girls didn’t exist, maybe he’d forget about them. Not that it’d be a permanent solution, but good enough for him. 

As the bus bumped down the street (the bus driver was rather careless, which made for good jokes), Hajime’s brain had decided to stop functioning for a little bit and take a break. Or in other words, he was half-conscious and standing while on the verge of sleep. 

So when the bus inevitably came to an abrupt stop at a traffic light, all those sleeping woke up, and people were flung into the air above their seats. (Not metres higher, but a few centimetres. The record was somewhere around 15 centimetres above the seat.) And Hajime, being one of the unlucky lot asleep, woke up, and lost his grip on the handle he was so sure he could hold decently, unlike his conversations. 

Hajime’s hand released the handle as he fell backwards, certain he was going to fall and hurt himself. Maybe he’d get out of school then? Or get a concussion, even better! Maybe if he had all this time in his thoughts, he could’ve done something to prevent himself from getting hurt from the driver’s careless driving. 

At least, until he recognized the arm on his arm and the girl next to him. Short light pink hair, around 20 centimetres shorter, and in the Hope’s Peak Academy uniform with a cat bag on her back. The console she was holding the last time they met looked to be a GameGirl, which she was holding in her free hand. 

“Oh, you’re the one who lives in Apartment 401.” Hajime stated, now coming to the realization that neither Chiaki nor Nagito gave him their apartment number. Although, that apartment had been the only one empty on Floor 4 for the last couple months, so it’d only make sense that they had moved into 401. 

“Yeah. I’m Nanami Chiaki, remember?” Her voice was tired, did she not get a lot of sleep? And like an idiot, Hajime didn’t answer, and just stared. 

“I’m a student at Hope’s Peak starting today. I’m the Ultimate Gamer. Do you think you can show me around?” Continued Chiaki, who by now had her eyes locked onto her GameGirl. 

Hajime hesitated, by now his reputation was worse than mostly everyone’s, and a lot of people had heard of the cheating incident. Although, this was an opportunity for someone other than Kazuichi to know him. Except Hajime wasn’t the type to make many friends. “I….. Guess?” Hajime gave a smile when Chiaki looked up from her screen, which she returned. Hajime raised his arm to grab the handle he was holding before, with Chiaki returning her focus to her game. 

-x-

While the bus was on the way to Hope’s Peak High School, another student had decided to take another route. With his earbuds playing Hellevator and bike going next to the bus heading to Hope’s Peak, Nagito was sure he’d arrive at school at a decent time. Not that it mattered to him all that much anymore. 

Although, all thoughts of him getting to school at a good time flew fully out the window (they were teetering over the edge previously) once Nagito took notice of the speed the bus had picked up. God, wasn’t Chiaki supposed to be on that bus?

Well, at least it was smooth sailing from there. If you ignored the fact that Nagito took the longer way to school, well aware of the scoldings he’d receive. 

-x-

Students were walking towards the entrance to Hope’s Peak High School on what could be considered a rather normal day. The sun was shining bright, possibly brighter than some of the students' futures, and the wind was blowing a cool breeze. 

On top of that, Hajime had supposedly made a new friend. He, among other students, was walking towards the school. And similarly to the other students, he was talking to someone who could very well be a friend. 

“Is the guy from last night okay?” Hajime asked Chiaki, who was playing on her handheld console. She had almost bumped into a lamppost or tree a couple times, with Hajime there to steer her away. 

“Nagito? Yeah, he should be fine, I think.” Chiaki said, the sound of buttons being clicked with a slight intensity growing progressively louder. How did she manage playing a video game and keeping up a conversation?

“Alright. So, what’s the relationship between you two?” Since Nagito very helpfully wouldn’t give me any answers, asking Chiaki seemed to be my best bet. 

“Nagito? He’s my younger brother.” She yawned, walking into the direction of a bush before I gently nudged her away. 

“Ah, I figured. You two look quite different though.” Hajime paused, not receiving a response from Chiaki. That was a cue to continue, right? “How old is he?” 

More button clicking came from Chiaki’s direction before she answered tiredly. “He’s also a freshman at Hope’s Peak. He should be around here somewhere…. Probably.” 

“He’a also a freshman? Are you two twins?” Hajime asked.

“Mmmm. No. We were born a month apart, although we were supposed to be twins. It’s a bit…. Complicated. I don’t think he wants to admit he’s related to me.” Chiaki said, pausing throughout her sentences. Perhaps it was for dramatic effect. Yeah, that. That was a good enough conclusion for the time being. 

“Doesn’t want to admit he’s related to you? He seems like the type.” Hajime said, choosing not to mention how Nagito didn’t say he knew Chiaki when Hajime asked. They kept walking until they reached the entrance of the school. 

“If you turn left from there,” Hajime said, pointing north-east, “you’ll reach the teacher’s office.” Chiaki nodded in agreement after taking her eyes away from her video game. She was a step away from being inside the school before she looked back at Hajime.

“Thanks. I’ll see you later.” And with that, she was on her way. Something about her was cute, that’s for sure. How did he not notice that yesterday? Not to say that her brother wasn’t cute either. God, how did he go from assisting Chiaki to complimenting her and her brother’s appearances? At least it was all in his head. He walked towards his classroom, the faint stinging in his hands long forgotten. 

Hajime entered the classroom silently, something he might’ve picked up from Izuru. Junko, Mukuro and Tsumugi were talking as Hajime managed to sneak past them. Well, for the most part. Junko noticed his presence, tapping the two girls next to her to look at him. 

Sitting on Hajime’s desk was a pile of trash, which people seemed to just have ignored. Hajime glanced at Kazuichi, who was staring away from his direction. Giggles from Junko’s direction could be heard as Hajime put his backpack on the hook attached to his desk. With a sigh, Hajime forced himself to his locker-like cubicle where his textbooks and the like were located. Opening it up, the first thing that was noticeable had to be the trash stuffed in the cubicle. How far was Junko willing to go with these acts of harassment? 

The temptation to throw one of the crushed up cans at Junko’s face stirred around in Hajime’s mind as he took out one of his textbooks from under the mess. He’d have to clean it up later, when he was less mad. Trash cluttered as some of it spilled to the ground, Kazuichi standing up from his desk. Although, all thoughts of forgiveness were thrown out the window once Junko placed her hand on Kazuichi’s shoulder, forcibly shoving him back into his seat. 

“Don’t try to do anything. Or should we do it to you instead?” Junko said, Kazuichi avoiding the glances from Junko and Hajime. How much longer was Kazuichi just going to let this happen? Hajime turned his head back to his cubicle, listening to the sane side of his brain and picking up the trash from his locker to shove in the trash can.

Words like “We did a good job.” and “It’s funny.” could be easily heard to anyone in the room, not just Hajime. Yet, no one did a single fucking thing. 

-x-

Chiaki watched as Mr. Munakata looked through her school files, doing her best to suppress a yawn. She had read up a little bit about the teachers at the school so that she wouldn’t be totally confused. Her game console had been placed into the pocket of her cat sweater, which she wasn’t entirely sure she was allowed to wear. Although Nagito had worn his classic 55 sweater when he departed for school, he wasn’t exactly one to follow the rules anymore. Hajime hadn’t worn any special items of clothing when he was walking with her to the school entrance. Oh well, it probably wasn’t worth worrying about. 

“You’re a pretty smart student. Despite falling asleep in class, of course.” Munakata turned his head up to look at Chiaki, who by now looked and felt ready to sleep while standing. “Nanami Chiaki, I’m expecting a lot from you. Do what you’ve been doing before, minus the sleeping in class.” 

“Okay.” Chiaki replied sleepily. The other two teachers currently around, Ms. Yukizome and Ms. Kirigiri, took a look at Chiaki’s file. Ms. Yukizome seemed quite happy, while Ms. Kirigiri appeared rather unfazed. Although, from what she could tell, Ms. Kirigiri didn’t seem like the type to be fazed by anything at surface level. 

“That’s amazing Chiaki! You’re not only cute, but smart too!” Said Ms. Yukizome, who walked over and gave her a pat on the back. 

“Thank you, Ms. Yukizome.” Chiaki yawned, hands snaking into her pocket. If only it was appropriate to pull out her console and play a game….

“But, isn’t there another student coming today? Komaeda Nagito, if I’m correct.” Said Ms. Kirigiri, her voice less enthusiastic as Ms. Yukizome was. Sounds of agreement (to Ms. Kirigiri’s statement, of course.) came from the other two teachers as they flipped to Nagito's school files.

“Where is your younger brother?” Asked Mr. Munakata, his voice stern and colder than Ms. Kirigiri’s, definitely not as cheery as Ms. Yukizome. 

“Well…. Nagito should be here soon… I think.” And right on cue, Nagito stepped into the office, pine green jacket and all. Nagito’s zippered shoes were an odd addition to his whole look, his backpack slung over one shoulder. He walked towards the teachers, standing a fair distance away from them and Chiaki. 

The teachers in the room, Ms. Kirigiri excluded, gave him strange looks. It wasn’t that this was entirely new, as Nagito was very thin, had a sickly pale skin tone, and his hair looked like white cotton candy. Or a cloud, depending on how you viewed it. 

Mr. Munakata took a couple steps towards Nagito, holding up the school file a little higher. “Komaeda Nagito.” He moved his arm and the file out of his own face, meeting eyes with Nagito. “You’re late on your first day. What’s with that hair? You better straighten up.” Mr. Munakata crossed his arms, paper still in hand. 

“It’s only his first day Kyosuke. Cut him some slack! Although you are in my class Nagito, so you shouldn’t be late! My class can tell you all about what happens when you’re late!” Said Ms. Yukizome. “You can follow me, Chiaki, follow Ms. Kirigiri.” 

-x-

The class was conversing, as usual. The common topics like homework, crushes, and idols were up in the air, with the conversations going silent as Ms. Yukizome walked into the room. Well, mostly silent. 

“Hey! Can you guys please be quiet? We have a new friend joining our class.” Ms. Yukizome said, tapping the side of the podium. Hajime had cleaned the trash out of his cubicle and off his desk a few minutes prior, glad he had done so. Maybe Chiaki was his new classmate?

Heads turned to the door as one student (Toko) murmured “W-we got a transfer student in the m-middle of the year? They m-must be a sucker f-for attention, huh?”

Ignoring the comment, the transfer student walked into the room with a smile. Something about it looked a bit insincere, faked almost. Of course, it took a little while before Hajime could fully register who it was, and he met the eyes of Komaeda Nagito. After their previous interaction, Hajime couldn’t help but feel slightly embarrassed, and he quickly looked down at his desk (Was he picking up Kazuichi’s new habits?) and did his best to ignore the stare that was lingering. The stare was probably from Nagito.

“Can you introduce yourself?” Ms. Yukizome asked, and Hajime let himself look back up. Politeness and a touch of curiosity, that was it. 

“I’m the Ultimate Lucky Student, Komaeda Nagito. Nice to meet you.” Nagito said, short and simply. Hajime knew his Ultimate Talent now too, which was a good thing. Luck was probably a lot more interesting than art. 

“That’s it?” Asked Tenko, a few laughs spreading across the room. Some girls said things like “You’re so handsome!” and “He’s so cute!”. Even some guys admitted to Nagito being attractive. Hajime wasn’t going to add to any of those comments, but it didn’t mean that he didn’t agree. 

With a tapping the side of the podium, the classroom (mostly) silenced once again. “Be quiet students! It would be unfortunate if there were to be a random quiz, right?” Ms. Yukizome threatened, and the class fully silenced. 

“Is that all you have to say, Nagito? You can tell us a bit more about yourself if you’d like.” Ms. Yukizome suggested.

Nagito looked at Ms. Yukizome before responding. “I don’t think the Ultimates would want to waste their time listening to an introduction of someone like me.” He said calmly, the same fake smile as when he first walked into the classroom never leaving his face. Hajime glanced at Junko, who smiled deviously. 

Ms. Yukizome looked at Nagito with an upset face. “We don’t put ourselves or other people down in this classroom! We’re all Ultimates, me included, so there’s no need to think more highly of other people or ourselves.” She gave Nagito a pat on the back, which looked more like a slap. Everyone knew Ms. Yukizome always had good intentions, except for maybe Nagito, who laughed awkwardly at the sudden contact, moving away from Ms. Yukizome. 

“You can sit behind Hajime. He’s our Ultimate Artist with the spiky hair.” She pointed to Hajime, who avoided eye contact with both the people at the front of the room. 

Kokichi turned to Hajime. “Isn’t he pretty cool? I would totally go after him if I wasn’t after Saihara-chan. I’ll pull the most amazing prank on Nagito, and upload it to social media. It’ll get tons of views!” Said Kokichi happily. 

“Why does he have to sit right behind me?” Hajime asked aloud, which Kokichi ignored. 

“What’s up with him? Looks like a creep….” Kazuichi muttered, sounding more like his usual self. 

“He’s totally my type.” Junko said, smiling.

Nagito walked down the middle aisle created by the rows of desks, staring straight ahead. The smile was no longer on his face, but the rest of Hajime’s classmates seemed to be smiling when Nagito was passing them by. Either that, or they looked shocked. With the exception of a couple of people, who were giving him suspicious looks or glares. Hajime met Nagito’s eyes as he walked by him, smiling at Hajime. It appeared more sincere, one that made Hajime feel a flutter in his stomach. 

And while Hajime was internally freaking out about this sudden feeling, he could almost hear a growl coming from Junko. Probably ‘cause Nagito had just ignored her. The Ultimate Fashionista, ignored. That had to be one for the history books. Especially since she had a lot of cleavage showing and two big ponytails on her head. Nagito sat down behind Hajime, still ignoring Junko. 

“If guys are too easy, they’re not as attractive.” Junko assured herself out loud, being ignored once again. 

Kaito looked over at Nagito and Kazuichi, then to Shuichi saying “Look. Those are the silent seats. I should stay away from that side of the room.”. Shuichi laughed awkwardly. 

“Let’s have a good day today, rotten oranges!” Said Ms. Yukizome, walking out of the room. Hajime and most of his classmates responded with “Yes Ms. Yukizome!”.

As soon as Ms. Yukizome walked out of the room, conversations quickly picked up where they were left off. Hajime took a quick glance behind him, seeing Nagito put some earbuds in. Hajime noticed Tenko walking up to him. Well this should be interesting.

“Look at you, trying to be all cool.” Tenko crossed her arms. “What are you listening to?” Hajime could tell that if Tenko didn’t seem to hate guys, she’d take his earbud out and listen for herself.

“It’s nothing special, really. Just k-pop. You shouldn’t be focusing your attention on someone like me.” Nagito smiled. 

“ _ Just _ k-pop? Not even going to tell me what kind?” 

“My music tastes aren’t exciting. Not nearly as hopeful as what the rest of you Ultimates listen to!” Nagito seemed to have said something quietly after that, which Tenko and I didn’t seem to catch. 

“Well, anyway. Music is good and whatever, and you seem to have decent taste for a degenerate male, but magic is much cooler. Like that famous magician, Yumeno Himiko.” Tenko signaled for Kaede to pass her something from her desk. Once Tenko received what Kaede gave her, she slid it on Nagito’s desk. 

“It’s a poster all about Yumeno Himiko, the Ultimate Magician. You should read it.” Tenko said, sounding rather nice for a change. 

“Thank you, but I’m not a huge fan of magic. I’m sure someone else would love to read all about the Ultimate Magician.” Nagito said, almost shoving the sheet back at Tenko. 

Tenko shoved the sheet back at him. “Hey. That’s rude, but expected behavior from a male.” The sheet ended up back in Tenko’s hands as she walked back to her seat. 

Next to Nagito was Fuyuhiko, who decided to suddenly say something. “Hey bastard, since you transferred in the middle of the year, you’ve probably got some kind of story to tell. Did you get in trouble or some shit?” Nagito didn’t respond to that. “Anyway, we’ve got gym class next. Better get your shit together quickly, Mr. Naegi is nice but that doesn’t mean slacking off and making the rest of us look bad is okay.” 

Speaking of gym, Hajime looked inside his backpack for his gym clothes, since they weren’t in his cubicle.  _ Where did I put my gym clothes? _ Hajime hit his palm against one of his sketchbooks, wincing as a sting ran through his hand. Hajime sighed. Hopefully he hadn’t damaged the sketchbook. 

-x-

Gundham had his Four Dark Devas of Destruction in one of his hands and on his shoulders while he restocked the convenience store he worked at. Sure, the presence of his Four Dark Devas could no longer make his position at his current workplace secure, but that was merely because the mortal that owned the store wouldn’t be able to see the dark energy radiating off of them. 

However, when Gundham spotted Nevermind Sonia outside attempting to put up a sign, Gundham knew the responsible, adult thing to do would be to assist her. So Gundham gently ushered his hamsters into his scarf before walking across the street to help Sonia. He knew that Sonia could do things on her own, she was a strong princess after all, but it was just an act to be a good neighbouring shop worker. 

And so, Gundham had now successfully managed to convince Sonia to let him place the sign for her business up for her, and had already finished. Sonia insisted that she could do it herself, but maybe that’s the way ex-wives always acted…? At least she still liked looking at his Four Dark Devas of Destruction, who were sitting on his shoulders and hands. 

“Thank you, Gundham, for putting up the sign, but I can do it myself. And it’s nice to see your Four Dark Devas are still with you all the time. But I must go work, so if you’ll excuse me.” Sonia smiled at Gundham, and went back into her real estate store. 

“It appears she has not changed through the years.” Gundham sighed, going back into the convenience store. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact - I have actually received a lecture on mitigation during gym class once. It was an hour long, and not fun to listen to.


	3. Misery complete, and so is the revenge.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hajime suffers, but karma's a bitch. Isn't that right, Enoshima Junko?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, hello, thanks for reading this chapter! 
> 
> Just so you're aware, updates are not frequent. I wish they could be, but sadly, I have work to do. I'll aim for one update at least once a month, maybe once every 3 weeks. Uh, yeah. 
> 
> (If you found my AO3 account and we know each other in real life, I'm sorry.)

Hajime stood in the gym, wearing his regular uniform. Why? Because, conveniently on a gym day, his gym clothes just had to disappear. At least his regular school uniform had long pants rather than a miniskirt. Still, it wasn’t comfortable to wear during gym class, as shorts made for running around and doing any sort of physical activity would be much better than long pants made for walking around a schoolyard and hallways.

And not that he was in any way questioning the abilities of their gym teacher, but Mr. Naegi seemed more fit to…. Not teach. At all. He let students step over him (figuratively, of course) and didn’t seem like he knew exactly what he was doing. A rumour once spread that he was trying to be promoted to a homeroom teacher, but the only position available at the time was for the gym teacher. The rumour was spread the year before Hajime had attended, but somehow it spread to the new students as well. Although, maybe messing with a doormat holding a metre stick was a dumb idea at best. 

“Line up double arm’s length apart, please.” Mr. Naegi said. “One two, go.” Placing the metre stick down, Mr. Naegi turned to face the class. “Alright, we’re going to be stretching before we do any physical activity. Anyone want to tell us why?” 

The class was silent, as any class would be when asked a question like this. Especially in gym class. At least it wasn’t like that mitigation lecture Hajime (and Kazuichi) had to sit through in middle school. 

“Ooooookay. Well, follow my movements.” Mr. Naegi got into a lunge, followed by the rest of the class. Excluding Hajime, who was in a half lunge. 

“1, 2, 3, 4,” Hajime could feel eyes on him, how fun. “5, 6, 7, 8. Switch sides.” So, essentially, repeat. 

“1, 2, 3, 4,” Hajime looked behind himself, glancing at a smirking Junko. He rolled his eyes. “5, 6, 7, 8.” The class stood back up. 

A phone rang, Mr. Naegi’s phone to be exact. Mr. Naegi took his phone out of his pocket, answering it. 

“Hello? … Yes. I will be right there.” Some chatter came from the other students as Mr. Naegi put his phone away. 

“Uh, sorry. I have to go do something right now. You guys have groups, right? If not, Class President, number the students into two groups. Group 1 does dodgeball, group 2 does basketball. I’ll be right back.” And with that, Mr. Naegi ran out of the room. Some classmates asked if we weren’t going to have class today, and others just questioned the scenario. Like why exactly the teacher would just run out of class. 

Equipment was placed out, and Hajime had been placed in group 1, with Junko, Mukuro, and Tsumugi. A notable mention in group 1 was Kazuichi. Nagito was in group 1, along with Kokichi. Something about Kokichi talking to the “new student” didn’t seem very good, although Nagito wasn’t participating. 

For the time being, Hajime hadn’t been hit out, and the basketball game seemed like a lot more fun than the dodgeball game was. From what was visible, Kokichi was bothering Nagito about something. Probably joining the game. Whatever it was, Nagito did not appear to want to join, before being dragged in by Kokichi. Hajime wondered what Chiaki would do if she was in this class right now. Until the class started screaming. 

From what Hajime could gather, Nagito had shot a basketball into a net backwards. Twice. That was certainly more interesting than whatever the dodgeball game was, and it was mainly populated with girls. Junko picked up a basketball which had rolled over to the dodgeball side of the court, and threw the ball to Mukuro. 

“I’m changing the rules. From now on, this is ground dodgeball. You know? You won’t get out by just being hit.” Junko smiled at me deviously. “Here we go.” Mukuro threw the ball on the ground, starting the game. 

The students on Hajime’s side were dropping like flies, with only a couple others left, including him. Mukuro had the ball, throwing it at Hajime. His first instinct was to block himself, as the ball was coming for his head, so his arm took most of the hit. But the force had thrown Hajime off, causing him to fall to the ground. Hajime glanced up, watching as Mukuro restrained Kazuichi. A guess that presented itself in Hajime’s mind was that Kazuichi was trying to help him, but maybe that was just wishful thinking. 

“He has no shame.” Said Junko, looking condescendingly at Hajime, with her hands on her hips. 

“That’s why he would cheat on a test.” Tsumugi said. 

Mukuro nodded in silence, before having her foot stomped on by Junko. That must’ve been some kind of hint, because Mukuro finally said something after that. “Do it right. It’s so boring because of you.” It sounded almost scripted, but that didn’t matter. 

Tsumugi had somehow picked up the ball, rolling it around in her hands. Hajime stood back up, since everyone who’s ever played any game of dodgeball knows that getting hit anywhere above the waist didn’t count. Fuyuhiko snatched the ball out of Tsumugi’s hands, throwing it at Hajime. His arm was hit, but it was below his waist now, so he was out. But if Hajime didn’t understand that, Fuyuhiko had to make some kind of comment. 

“You’re out, dumbass.” And Fuyuhiko walked away. 

“What’s his problem?” Asked Tsumugi. Mukuro let go of her grip on Kazuichi. 

“Don’t bother. He’s a yakuza, remember? I don’t think you’d want to get involved with him.” Junko said, turning back to Hajime. “And also, get off the-” 

A basketball had hit Junko at the back of her head, causing a high pitched scream to escape her lips. She turned around to the kids on the basketball side of the gym. “Who the hell just threw that at me?!” 

“I’m sorry.” Nagito said in a rather half-assed way. “The ball slipped out of my hands.” A couple chuckles came from around the gym, those people being quickly shut up by a glare from Junko. 

An awkward laugh came from Junko’s direction, the fashionista tucking a piece of hair behind her ear. “You should’ve been more careful.” Nagito didn’t respond to that, walking back to the game on the basketball side. Junko, to say the least, didn’t look happy. 

-x-

The most recent period was over at Hope’s Peak High School, and Chiaki was walking with her classmates as it was lunch. She was walking near the window, and while yawning, she noticed a familiar face. Hinata Hajime appeared to be limping towards the school, although trying to hide it. She would’ve tried to help him, but she was a couple floors up and had somewhere to be. It was a shame, but he could make it on his own. If she bumped into him at some point, then maybe she’d help her out. Didn’t Nagito carry around band-aids?

-x-

A question that may or may not be circulating your mind could be where Naegi Makoto went. The answer to that question would be running through the halls, trying to deliver papers to Mr. Munakata from Principal Tengan. The rumours that had spread through the school the year before? All true. Makoto was really trying to get that promotion. He would bump into students occasionally, with papers flying around when he did. Makoto sighed. Maybe soon after this, he’d finally become a homeroom teacher….

-x-

Hajime was rising his hands at the outdoor taps, feeling a tap on his shoulder. He looked at the sleepy girl, Chiaki, who handed him a bandaid. 

“I saw you limping, and thought you might need this.” Hajime accepted the bandaid, although the solution seemed like something teachers would do when you were in elementary school. 

“Thanks.” Hajime peeled the bandaid off, sticking it on the side of his knee. 

“Nagito has a bunch, I just asked him for one… You should thank him too.” Chiaki had her GameGirl open now, playing a game. 

“Uh… Sure.” Hajime responded. Nagito seemed a little weird and distant, and he was probably going to forget to thank him, but that would be fine. 

Chatter was heard faintly in the distance, which Hajime quickly recognized as chatter from his classmates. Hajime glanced over his shoulder to look at them, giving a wave to Chiaki before walking away. 

-x-

Nagito saw Chiaki with Hajime, who had now walked away. Nagito walked towards his sister, who had looked up from her game at Hajime. He looked at Hajime too, and although he knew that his classmates were behind him (not directly behind him, but they had a clear view of him) and that their stares were glued on him and his sister. 

“Who’s next to Nagito?” Junko asked. 

“That’s Nanami Chiaki, the new student in Class Two.” Mukuro responded. 

“I heard they were siblings.” Ruruka said. 

“She was the reason for all the cheering? I wonder if they’re twins.” Seiko added. 

“I can only be jealous of Chiaki, there’s no point in being jealous of a degenerate male.” Said Tenko.

“Chiaki’s great and whatever, but Nagito’s so much better. I’ve already called dibs on Nagito, so the rest of you girls better back off.” Junko said, pointing at the girls in the group.

“I’ve already got my sweet little Shumai, so you don’t need to worry. And Tenko’s head over heels for that small ma-”

“Don’t continue that sentence Kokichi.” Tenko said, cutting off Kokichi. 

The stares had lifted now that the chatter had moved with Nagito’s classmates, but Nagito and Chiaki were still looking at Hajime. Said tan boy had now walked out of sight, so Nagito glanced at Chiaki, before resuming to gaze at the spot where Hajime had once been. 

-x-

Hajime was back in his classroom as his class reunited after the lunch break. Most of them were still in their gym clothes for whatever reason, and Hajime still had yet to find his. He had found a piece of garbage on the classroom floor, probably from when Junko had put trash on his desk and in his cubicle, and was going to throw it out. When he opened the trash can and dropped the piece of garbage in, he saw his gym clothes in the trash. 

He took his clothes out, ignoring the giggles and stares from his classmates (Junko, Mukuro, and Tsumugi specifically). Hajime heaved a heavy sigh, placing them on his desk. 

“Don’t you smell garbage from somewhere?” Junko said. “Garbage filled with utter despair!” 

“I can see that garbage has picked up more garbage.” Tsumugi said. 

“Gosh, how would you wear that? That’s so nasty.” Mukuro commented. 

Trying to take his mind off things, Hajime opened his phone. And what did he see? A text from Kazuichi. It was about time. 

**mechboy:** Hajime, meet me at the gym restroom after class. 

It was better than nothing, but Kazuichi rarely typed with grammar, or referred to Hajime by his name over text. Unless Hajime had done something to bother him, and Kazuichi wanted to bother him back. Something was up, but hey, Kazuichi was texting him and that was enough to make Hajime feel happier. 

So class was over, and Hajime walked into the male’s gym restroom. Why the washrooms, he wasn’t sure, but maybe it was for some privacy? Hajime spotted Kazuichi out of the corner of his eye, who was fiddling with the beanie on his head. If he was wearing his jumpsuit, Hajime was sure he’d be messing around with the zipper on that instead of his precious beanie. Kazuichi looked up at Hajime, making eye contact. 

“Kazuichi, hey.” Hajime said. Kazuichi didn’t respond, but the sound of footsteps from behind were growing louder. 

“Shut the door.” A familiar voice said, and sure enough, there was the devil herself, Enoshima Junko, with her sidekicks. Mukuro had a backpack on her back which Hajime noticed when she had returned, probably from closing the door like Junko had instructed. 

“It’s good to see you, Hinata Hajime.” Junko said, hands on her hips. 

“Junko, what are you doing in the male’s bathroom? Are you a pervert or something? Maybe hoping Nagito would be here so you can spy on him?” Hajime said sarcastically, crossing his arms across his chest. Hajime looked over at Kazuichi, who was now avoiding eye contact like he was previously. He got the hint after that. Hajime was set up for some kind of humiliation. 

“Kazuichi….” Hajime said, watching as Junko stepped closer to him. He took a step back. 

“I’ve told you before, right? You’re so hopeful, it’s annoying. Do the cheating by yourself, don’t bring Kazuichi into it.” Hajime rolled his eyes. “Whether I cheat or not is none of your business. So just fuck off already!” Her demeanor changed similarly to a flick of a switch. Except, knowing Enoshima Junko, she probably had multiple of these switches. And all of them had the same, annoying bitch as the base. 

Junko handed her phone to Mukuro, who fiddled with it, turning it sideways and pointing it at the current conflict. 

While that was happening, Tsumugi spoke up. “Stop trying to act like a goody two-shoes, will you?” 

Junko leaned in, getting too close to Hajime, who took a step away. “Did I ask you to show me your answers? Why did you ruin my cheating?! The one involved didn’t even say anything.” 

Hajime’s head turned to Kazuichi, trying to confirm this. The avoiding of eye contact was enough to tell him all he needed to know. Hajime’s glance went back to Junko, glaring at her. 

“What are you glaring at me for, peasant?” Junko pushed Hajime back by pushing her pointer finger at his forehead, and walking closer and closer to him until his back hit the back of a stall and he fell to the ground. (An empty one, luckily.) 

“By glaring at me like that, what do you think you’ll accomplish?” Junko stared condescendingly at Hajime. “You better stop getting involved in other people’s business from now on.” Tsumugi took a can out of the backpack on Mukuro’s back, the black haired girl still filming the entire thing. Tsumugi handed the can to Junko, who shook it up. 

“Do you understand?” Junko opened the can in Hajime’s face, which turned out to be beer. It was horrible, and it was being poured on his hair, but that annoying piece of hair sticking up on his head didn’t seem to lower. Hajime saw a bright pink blob moving closer to where he was, so his guess was that Tsumugi had dragged him over, since Mukuro was probably still filming this entire thing. A gasp came from Kazuichi as Hajime just sat there, knowing he could do something about this. There were three girls, one with a personal bodyguard, the personal bodyguard who was the Ultimate Soldier, and the Ultimate Cosplayer, who could probably do nothing but talk about anime and verbally abuse others. Mukuro was filming, so maybe he’d have a chance…?

Hajime punched Junko on her left kneecap, causing her to drop the can on his head. He winced, that didn’t go as planned. Junko seemed to be injured, but she didn’t seem to care. She just opened another two cans, pouring it on him. 

“God, it smells like alcohol in here.” She shook Hajime’s shoulder violently. “Hajime, wake up!” Hajime was about to hit Junko’s arm before she pulled it away. “He’s totally drunk. What should we do? Guys, try to help her.” Kazuichi looked just about ready to run away. 

“Should we upload this to the internet?” Tsumugi asked, watching as Junko poured a bucket of water on Hajime’s head. 

“It looks so real. He looks totally drunk.” Junko teased, throwing the bucket to the side. Hajime wiped the water out of his eyes, looking to where Kazuichi was. He was slowly backing out of the room, despite the look on Hajime’s face asking for some help. With that, Kazuichi bolted out of the washroom as fast as possible. Hajime’s eyes fell to his shoes, which were soaked with water and beer, like the rest of him at this point. 

“We’re leaving now. Come back out when you’re sober, ‘friend’.” Junko smiled evilly, walking out of the stall. Hajime stood up and tried to run out, but Mukuro had stopped recording a moment ago and closed the door in his face. He tried to push it open, but it was probably locked from the outside. 

“When did Kazuichi leave?” Mukuro asked. 

“He probably realized he was next, and fled like a losing villain in a manga.” Tsumugi chuckled. 

“Alright, let’s go.” Junko said, the sound of footsteps slowly fading, but the lights going out with them. 

“Hello? Anyone? Kazuichi? Somebody?” He yelled. “Fuck!” It was becoming clear he wasn’t getting anyone’s attention, and he was just frustrated as fuck that he didn’t do anything to get any kind of revenge on the trio. He was sure that Kazuichi was long gone by now, and that Junko, Tsumugi and/or Mukuro were not going to help him, even if he begged on his knees. Not that those three were even here. 

“God…. Someone just help me. Kazuichi, Chiaki, anybody….” Hajime backed away from the stall’s door, scooting against the wall and bringing his knees to his chest. The floor was scattered with beer cans, water and alcohol. It was cold now that the liquids were soaked into his clothes and still had a while to go before they dried. The washrooms barely got any heating, and it was Summer, turning Autumn soon enough. If anything, the AC was blasting in this building. Hajime remembered that he had brought his phone into the bathroom, and if it was in the stall with him and somehow still functioning, he could use it to call for help! 

Except for the fact that there was a chance his mother wouldn’t be so happy about how Hajime was drenched in beer and that he let himself be a punching bag for Junko and her lackeys to hit with despair, just to protect Kazuichi. (His mother, Nevermind Sonia, was a nice person, but even she too had things she wouldn’t tolerate.) Kazuichi was ignoring him, his classmates hated him (along with a lot of other people in the school now, thanks to Junko) and he didn’t have Chiaki’s phone number. He doubted he had Nagito’s number. 

Hajime set his phone down next to himself, taking a couple deep breaths in an attempt to calm himself down. He’d get out, one way or another.. Maybe he’d call Izuru, or Aunt Ibuki! But how would that-

A faint buzzing came from Hajime’s phone, and he snapped out of that train of thought, picking up his phone. His first thought was that it was someone trying to see where he was (Chiaki perhaps, since she seemed to be one of the few who didn’t hate him), but it was just the Revenge Note thing blinking and apparently vibrating his phone. What did he have to lose? Hajime clicked the app. 

**“Will you be the Revenge God?”** was what the app said at the top when he opened it up, no loading screen or anything. And below that… An area to put a name to “target for revenge”. If this was a prank, it was a very well thought out one. Without much thought, Hajime typed in “Enoshima Junko”, a quick flash of all the annoying things she had done to him over the span of the previous days. To Kazuichi too. He pressed the start button, seeing the screen change. The new text on the screen said “The target meets all conditions. We’ll proceed with the revenge.” What exactly the conditions were was something Hajime wanted to potentially look farther into, and what exactly said revenge was, but at the end of the day, he was still stuck in the dumb bathroom stall, waiting for someone to let him out. 

All the pictures, laughs and giggles, years spent together, did that really mean nothing to Kazuichi to the point where he could just run away and not return? Whatever, thinking further into that was a problem for him to deal with later. Hajime closed his eyes, drifting into a cold and dreamless sleep. 

If Hajime had decided to stay awake even just a few seconds longer, he would’ve been able to hear light footsteps approaching the stall he was trapped in. 

-x-

Junko, Mukuro, and Tsumugi were standing out in the street, a bit late in the evening. Junko had made plans for karaoke, and was willing to give up time that could be used for filling her classmates with despair to have some fun. That is, if Junko could convince her mom to unsuspend her credit card. 

“I’m serious. I did really well on the test, but we had to retake it because of Hajime.” Junko insisted, ignoring the giggles from Tsumugi. “I was so shocked, I forgot everything.” 

“Whose child is that?” Her mom yelled from over the phone. Junko pulled the phone away from her ear once that happened, wincing at the sudden change in volume.

“That reminds me of a real life howler. Just over the phone, and not opened in-” 

“I don’t know! He’s a bad kid.” Junko half-yelled, sending a glare in Tsumugi’s direction. Tsumugi was a big nerd, and also a big fan of Junko, so getting her to shut up was easier than stealing candy from a baby. For Junko, at least. 

“His shameless self keeps coming to school every single day.” Junko cupped her hand around the speaker area of her phone, speaking into it. “Mom, I’m in the library right now, so I’ll be home later. I’m hanging up!” Junko hung up the phone before her mother could respond. 

“You’re in the library? Stop lying.” Tsumugi teased. 

“What?” Junko teased back, hearing a ping from her phone. Tsumugi and Mukuro were laughing in the background as Junko read what had appeared on her phone. It said something about being a target for revenge, but most of those things were all bullshit. “What is this? How annoying.” Junko turned off her phone ((not shutting down)), putting it in her pocket. She turned to Tsumugi and Mukuro with a smile. 

“Let’s go have fun!” She said cheerfully, walking away as the other two high-fived and followed behind. Well, Tsumugi high-fived Mukuro and they followed behind. 

Junko turned the corner, not seeing in time as a man supposedly cleaning the exterior of a sushi store in the process of being built accidentally splashed a bucket of water on Junko. 

“Oh. Oh no!” Tsumugi and Mukuro had rounded the corner milliseconds after Junko had been splashed, witnessing most of the incident. “I’m so sorry. Please wait.” The man ran into the half-built restaurant as Junko screamed, trying to brush the water off in a way. Mukuro and Tsumugi rushed to her side. 

“Gosh, these were new clothes too! What despair!” The other two girls were asking what they could do and if Junko was okay while trying to comfort her, and Junko shook them off her. 

“What do I do?” Junko exclaimed in a moderately whiny tone. 

-x-

A taxi pulled up near where the girls were (not near enough to be seen, but close enough), and out walked a woman with black hair, white, blue and pink stripes dyed in. She had black and white cones on her head, and wore a sailor uniform of sorts, despite obviously not being in school if she was  _ that _ drunk late at night. 

That young woman was none other than Ibuki Mioda, who looked at the taxi driver, the young man currently wearing a bit of a confused and scared expression, and saying goodbye before walking into the apartment complex where Ibuki lived with Nevermind Sonia, Hinata Hajime, and Kamukura Izuru. Ibuki was tired, and she was lucky she could still stand properly. The elevator doors opened, and Ibuki had her eyes closed, occasionally opening as she walked outside the elevator. When she finally opened her eyes outside of the elevator, she saw none other than Hinata Hajime, lying against the wall, with his eyes closed. 

“Oh gosh.” Ibuki said, walking over to Hajime. “Hajime, what are you doing here?” She asked, realizing that there was a slim chance he was dead. “Hajime?” 

-x-

Hajime woke up, feeling warmer than when he fell asleep. Did he catch a fever or something? He sat up, rubbing his eyes. When he looked around, he was in his room, his mom sitting beside him.

“Goodness, Hajime, you’re fine. I’m glad.” She sighed. Sonia gently touched his forehead, probably checking for any signs of a fever or a cold. “I think you’re a bit better now.” Sonia smacked Hajime on the back of his head in a soft but harsh manner. 

“But don’t come home drunk again, alright? You better not be partying instead of attending class. Especially not at your age. Hope’s Peak Academy is such a great school, you should be spending your time studying or practicing your talent. You’re grounded for a couple of days. Again, don’t let this happen again until you’re of legal drinking age. Even then, please don’t come home drunk like Aunt Ibuki.” It was almost funny how quickly Sonia could go from being harsh to sweet and caring again. It was even funnier that Ibuki wasn’t really his Aunt, but she stayed with them because she was a good friend of Sonia’s who dreamt of touring the world as a musician. All she needed was a good agency to help her do that- one that wouldn’t cramp her style. 

“Thank you for your concern Mom, but I didn’t drink. Who brought me home?” Hajime said, slightly brushing off his mom’s previous words. 

“Aunt Ibuki brought you home, who else?” Sonia stood up, walking out of the room. Hajime felt a bit confused, how would Aunt Ibuki get into Hope’s Peak Academy? The boys washroom by the gym no less? It had to be someone else… But who? He stepped out of his room, shaking Ibuki awake who was currently napping on the couch. 

“Don’t shake Ibuki, Ibuki’s head hurts. Maybe too much headbanging and drinks last night.” Ibuki said, holding her head and lying back down. 

“I heard you brought me back home last night.” Might as well get straight to the point. 

“Well yes, but no. Ibuki saw you in the hall, outside the elevator. So Ibuki picked Hajime-chan up, and brought you into the apartment.” She said tiredly, her tone somewhat resembling a more energetic Chiaki. 

“Then who brought me to the apartment building?” It had to be someone who lived here, or who knew the door’s password. 

“Hmm… Ibuki might have. Probably did.” 

“Oh, really? Who did?” 

“Wait, Ibuki took a picture.” Ibuki sat upright, pulling her phone out from under her. She scrolled through what appeared to be an abnormal amount of drunk selfies with her taxi driver, who looked very confused in all of them. The interaction seemed like Ibuki had wanted to take some kind of goodbye selfie, so she took one. And more. A lot more than one would ever want to take. In some of them that she scrolled through, someone with a Hope’s Peak Academy uniform appeared to be carrying Hajime. It wasn’t really evident who it was, and it looked like it could be Chiaki or Nagito. Would Chiaki even be physically capable of carrying him? Nagito seemed very fragile too. Whatever, it had to be one of those two. No one else in Hope’s Peak lived at that particular apartment complex. 

“Auntie, this is very nice of you to show me this evidence, but I can’t tell who it is.” Hajime said. 

“Well, whoever it was, I remember one thing.” Hajime perked up. “They were very good looking.” Hajime slumped back down. 

“Yeah, right. Thanks.” He had school to attend in around 30 minutes. That gave him enough time to shower, brush his teeth, change, maybe even get some art squeezed in there. Luckily for him, Hope’s Peak Academy didn’t assign a lot of homework, and he had none to speedrun in the morning. 

~x~

Hajime walked out of his apartment, hearing the chime of the door lock. Despite a nagging feeling in the back of his mind reminding him that he’d have to retake the test he was accused of cheating on, he still wanted to know who had brought him to the building. Was it Chiaki, a small girl who didn’t look like she could carry someone taller and heavier than her, or Nagito, a tall boy who didn’t look like he could carry anything heavier than 60 pounds? He was letting his thoughts take over for a moment before he heard the sound of a door opening in front of him. He stepped back, realizing it was Chiaki who had come out of the door. Right. Because that was her apartment. 

Chiaki had her handheld console in hand, closing the door behind her. She looked up at Hajime, smiling at him. Hajime gave an awkward laugh and smiled back. 

“Hi. Let’s go.” Chiaki said, walking towards the elevator, Hajime following along. 

They were walking out of the apartment building, when Ibuki came from behind them and slung her arm around Hajime’s neck. It was like a friendly headlock, if that existed. 

“Hajime-chan, you forgot your wallet!” She seemed more energetic than she was when Hajime had questioned her about who had brought him inside. Ibuki handed him his wallet, before turning her head to Chiaki. 

“Hey, did I see you yesterday?” She asked Chiaki, pointing to her with the arm still around Hajime’s neck. Hajime turned to Chiaki, who looked at Ibuki with a blank expression. It looked slightly confused, but still, could it have been Chiaki who carried him back? 

Footsteps from the door came closer to them, revealing Nagito, who had his long green jacket on and his backpack slung over one shoulder. He had stopped walking when he reached Chiaki’s side, looking at Ibuki. Ibuki’s finger was now pointed at Nagito. 

“Was it him?” She thought about it for a moment. “Was it you?” Back to square 1. Hajime rolled his eyes, pulling Ibuki’s arm off him now that her grip was loose. 

“I’ll get going now.” He said, walking away as the other two students followed after giving a wave to Ibuki. 

-x-

A car was driving down the road as Junko was being half-lectured by her mother, with Mukuro sitting in the passenger seat, free from any punishment. At least from their mother, Junko might have to give Mukuro a lecture for letting her be lectured. 

“If that happened, you should have told me earlier. I will take care of everything, so just focus on your studies.” Junko’s mother said, applying some makeup and staring into her handheld mirror. 

“Yes, of course.” Junko said, sending a text to Mukuro despite her being right in front of her. The response was almost immediate, saying “The video of Hajime will be uploaded tonight.”. Junko would’ve prefered right now, since people were heading to school and when they arrived, they’d have a few minutes to scroll through social media and see the video when it went viral. The evening would do just fine though, as Hajime would feel the same amount of despair. Junko smirked at her phone, hearing the sound of a motorcycle pass by as the car came to an abrupt stop.

When the car did stop, Junko had hit her head on the seat in front of her, whining from the impact. She held her nose, ignoring her mother’s questions if she was okay. She hit her head on the car seat for God’s sake! Of course she wasn’t okay!

Cars were beeping from behind them as Junko felt blood coming out of her nose. Her mother asked the driver for some tissues, having them handed to her a moment later by Mukuro. Junko couldn’t help but feel a little off the whole time she was trying to clean her nose up, but that couldn’t take priority. 

-x-

Hajime walked into the classroom a little after Nagito, seeing as he was already seated at his desk. The moment he walked in, someone said “Oh look, it’s Hajime. Hajime’s here.”. He closed the door behind him as the room went silent. He looked at Junko, who only had a bandage around the bridge of her nose. She smiled at him in a condescending way as Hajime wondered when exactly this revenge was supposed to take place. Clearly the dumb app was just a troll afterall. Hajime walked to his desk, placing his backpack on the hook where it usually went. The classroom was still silent, one very quiet conversation happening on the side. 

Junko stood up from her seat, phone in hand. What was she up to this time? 

“Hajime didn’t just cheat.” Everyone looked at Junko, including Hajime. This wasn’t going in a good direction, was it?

“Did he do something else?” Teruteru asked, wiggling his eyebrows. Everyone gave him a look of disgust. 

“Not in the way you’re thinking. I saw him by chance, and took this video.” The class, excluding Hajime, Nagito, Kazuichi and Fuyuhiko, crowded around Junko as she opened her phone. Tsumugi and Mukuro were sitting with a smug smile on their faces. 

The video Mukuro had taken when Junko had poured beer on Hajime in the bathroom was playing, loud and clear for everyone to hear. Nagito put headphones in his ears, Fuyuhiko looking in the direction of the crowd but not going to see it for himself. It was around the time that Junko had said that Hajime was “totally drunk”. Words such as “oh my god” and “what the hell” were being mumbled loud enough to be heard. The side gasps and comments were brought up to a normal volume by now, Kokichi pulling out his phone and recording it. Kazuichi looked away from Junko. 

-x-

“This has to be dealt with harshly.” Said Junko’s mom, who was currently attending a meeting with the staff of the school. More specifically the teachers and the principal. Junko’s mother, a chairwoman of a successful company, who’s name was Enoshima Chiyo, turned her focus to the head teacher, Munakata Kyosuke. 

“Is it suspension or expulsion?” Chiyo asked. 

“Well of course! Head teacher, you heard that, right?” Tengan leaned towards Kyosuke in a somewhat menacing manner. Good thing they had chairs as boundaries. 

“Also,” All the teachers turned to face Chiyo. “don’t you think a retake is too much? You don’t understand how hard my daughter prepared for this test. How could she retake it?” She said, putting some emphasis in her words. No one really had any words for Chiyo.

“My girl is still in shock. She probably won’t do well on the retake.” The teachers sighed, but the principal seemed really convinced. 

“You’re right. A model student like Junko would definitely be stressed in a situation like this-” Yukizome Chisa ran into the meeting, because although she was late, she had something important to show the teachers. 

“Excuse me, principal.” In her hand, she held a phone. She placed it on the table where the chairs were seated around, in front of Tengan. 

“I think you need to see this.” All the teachers leaned in closer to the phone, looking at the screen. 

-x-

At this point, it didn’t even look like Junko was watching the screen, just the reactions of their classmates. Then, a familiar voice came out of the phone’s speaker. 

_ “Did I ask you to show me your answers? Why did you ruin my cheating?” _ The clip on the phone showed Junko pushing Hajime into a stall by pressing her finger up against his forehead and pretty much poking him back forcefully. The class was now pretty much silent. 

_ “The one involved didn’t even say anything!”  _ The visuals glitched a bit, but there was no doubt that the girl was Junko, and the person being pushed was Hajime. 

“What? So it was Junko who cheated?” Asked Seiko. The class now had their eyes on Junko, Kokichi still filming. The people who initially didn’t seem interested or wanted to ignore it were now paying attention, even if they weren’t part of the group around Junko. This included Hajime. 

“She made her take the blame?” Asked Aoi. 

“I knew it wasn’t him.” Kaito said. The video was pretty much just looping by this point, but it only made Junko look worse. 

“S-so it was J-Junko!” Toko said, pointing her finger at Junko. 

“She lied.” Leon added. 

Many more comments were added, mostly comments expressing shock or disgust in Junko for doing such a thing. Junko tapped the screen, the buttons on the side of her phone, but her phone kept playing the clip. Her fake red nails were making loud clicking noises as they hit the electronic. 

“Why won’t this turn off?!” She said, panicking. Junko was still hitting her screen when her hand was snatched away by the wrist. 

“Why are you turning it off?” Nagito said, dropping Junko’s limb just as quickly as he grabbed it. “It’s quite entertaining.” ((Junko being exposed as the entertaining bit.))

“This isn’t true.” Junko dropped her phone on the ground. “It wasn’t Hajime.” Her voice had a tone of true fear in it, one that came with being exposed. She stepped on her phone, listening as it was crushed under her shoes. 

“I said this isn’t true!” She screamed, the circle of people stepping away from her. Kokichi’s face for once didn’t have any fake emotion on it as he kept his phone recording the whole thing. Junko was hyperventilating, with Hajime showing no sympathy for the blonde. 

_ “This isn’t real!”  _

-x-

At the same time, the video that had been shown to Hajime’s class was being shown to the teachers, Chiyo, and Principal Tengan. Chiyo held her face in her hands, with the other teachers staring in awe. Except Kyoko, who was keeping her composure and looked calm as ever. 

“We almost punished an innocent student.” Kyoko said, arms crossed across her chest. 

“You saw that, right? We’ll deal with it according to school regulations.” Kyosuke said, ignoring Chiyo’s sighs of frustration and embarrassment. “Principal Tengan and Mrs. Chairwoman.” Tengan gave a few chuckles, probably of embarrassment, and Chiyo just looked upset. 

“I spoke too harshly out of anger earlier. When you’re young, who doesn’t cheat at least once.” The teachers internally rolled their eyes. It was obvious Tengan was being paid an extra something just to be nice to Junko. “It all becomes a memory and experience.” Tengan turned to look at Chiyo. “Don’t you think so, Mrs. Chairwoman?” 

Chiyo laughed awkwardly. “Of course. At that age, they can’t differentiate right from wrong.” Most of them could argue that differentiating right from wrong was something expected of a high schooler at Hope’s Peak High School, but they would get in trouble from the principal. They all looked annoyed though. 

“I will overlook it this time. Don’t make a big deal out of this. You can all go back to your places now.” The teachers let out sighs of annoyance as Tengan made a “shoo” motion with his hand. 

“Principal Tengan, why is it so dry and dusty in here? I think we should put an air purifier in your room.” The teachers gave an eye roll, externally and internally this time. 

“Gosh, it’s fine.” Tengan laughed.

“I need to make sure you’re family.” Chiyo insisted, all the teachers knowing it was so she could get away with whatever bullshit she wanted. 

“You’re too kind.” 

“I will excuse myself then.” Chiyo picked up her purse, saying something about assisting if they needed anything. (Really, it was if Tengan needed anything, keeping the teachers happy with bribes wasn’t Chiyo’s priority.) 

“Hey, what about the punishment?” Kyosuke asked.

“Hey, come on. What do you mean by punishment? Just go get ready for your class.” He said dismissively. 

-x-

Junko looked at the faces of her classmates and their glares mixed with disappointed stares. Some of the girls looked at her like she was someone bullyable. 

“It wasn’t me!” She shouted again, continuing to hyperventilate. 

“You’re so shameless.” Kokichi said. “Shouldn’t you apologize to Hajime?” 

“What? Why should I apologize?” Junko retorted. 

“You blamed it all on Hajime.”

Junko scoffed. “Do you have proof? Tell me if you have any!” 

“I do have proof! I took a video just in case!” Kazuichi, who was looking down at his table for the longest time, glanced up at the circle of people. 

“Should I upload it on social media? It’ll get tons of likes!” Kokichi spat, watching as Junko ran out of defenses. 

“I said it wasn’t me!” She screamed. By this point, it seemed slightly pathetic mixed with sad. At least the Revenge Note did what it was supposed to. 

-x-

Chiyo grabbed Junko by the arm as she was dragged out of school and down the stairs, Mukuro following behind. 

“Follow me. You’re dead.” Chiyo said, with clear annoyance in her voice. Junko was trying to get her arm out of her mom’s grip, but even Mukuro knew that fighting their mother was a dangerous act. 

“Mom, please-”

“How can you disgrace me like this?” Chiyo’s grip on Junko’s arm tightened. “Gosh.”

“It wasn’t me mom!” Junko shook the arm that was holding hers with her free hand, not being successful in releasing herself from her mother’s grasp. Her mother abruptly stopped. 

“Do you know how much money I’ve spent on you? You may be the Ultimate Fashionista, but your real title is the Ultimate Despair, no matter how much you want to deny it. You and your sister. If I have to deal with your whining any longer, I’m going to go crazy.” Chiyo tugged Junko along, 

“Mom, please!” The two made their way over to their car, despite Junko’s attempts to run back into school and fill someone with despair. Mukuro was still following, hopping into the passenger seat. Gosh, this family was troubled. 

-x-

The circle of classmates were now circled around Hajime, faces solemn as if they had just seen one of their friends die. Kokichi sat in his seat, turning around to face Hajime. 

“Hajime, I’m sorry. I misunderstood. I know I’m a liar, but I really do mean this.” 

More apologies were being said, one at a time. 

“I’m sorry for swearing at you over text.” 

“I-I also a-a-ap-apologize!” 

“I’m sorry.” 

Kazuichi turned his head slightly, still hanging his head in sadness like he had for the past few days. 

“It’s okay guys, the truth is out now. Thanks for your apologies though. You’re all forgiven.” Hajime smiled, a rare occurrence. It was to show his sincerity, but he could see others returning that smile. Even Fuyuhiko seemed to smile at this, however he would deny this if anyone asked, and a finger or two might be missing. 

And it was true that others were returning that smile, even from across the room. After all, Chisa had been standing in the doorway, watching her students make up with each other. 

“Hajime, do you want to have tteokbokki with us later?” Asked Kokichi. 

Hajime looked across the room a little bit, before nodding in agreement. “Sure.” 

His eyes wandered to Kazuichi, who looked up at him at the same time. Just as quickly as the two seemed to finally look at each other clearly, Kazuichi looked away again. It was okay. If he still needed space, Hajime would give him that space. 

-x-

It was another day at Hope’s Peak Academy. The sun was shining brightly as it usually did, showing the terrain of the building wonderfully. Class 1 was buzzing with life and conversation, and Enoshima Junko was missing. Ding dong, the witch is gone. For now, at least. No one knew when she’d be back, if she came back. At least, those were Hajime’s thoughts when he stepped into the classroom. He heard his phone buzzing with a notification, seeing that it was the Revenge Note app. 

He opened it up without a second thought, seeing how Junko was being pulled by the arm out of the school, the nosebleed, and how she was splashed with water. They were all pictures as proof, that’s what he supposed. The screen showed a message saying “Your revenge is complete.” and that must be the end of it. But if he had received this proof, it’d have to be someone he knew that was controlling this Revenge Note, right? He looked at her classmates, most of which on their phones or talking to the people around them. 

His gaze locked onto Nagito, the pretty pale boy who had just transferred here. The Revenge Note had appeared not too long after he had moved in, so maybe he could be the one behind all this? Nagito looked up at Hajime, looking at him with his head tilted slightly to the side in a confused manner. No, it couldn’t be him. There’s no way. But the same question appeared in his head again. If it wasn’t Nagito, who  _ could _ it be? The Master of Revenge Note? 


End file.
